Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Joy slowly came to her senses. Shaking her head, she felt like she’d just been put under a steam roller. And there was a sensation in her body that didn’t feel good at all. She slowly opened her eyes, only to see a swirling mass of…well, she didn’t quite know how to describe it.

It was like she was looking at a starry field of roses. Only, she was upside down, and the roses also looked like hockey sticks and there were vampires roaming around playing guitars and drums, and there were smiling faces floating about, and half fragments of color zipping around, and, and, and….

Joy shut her eyes for a moment. Trying to steady herself. “Ugh,” she groaned. “How did we end up in a crisis like this Mom?” She let her mind wander over important memories ever since their intercom was accidentally broken.
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“I wonder what’s got her spooked?”
“Who said that??”
----
“Riley? Riley, we want to talk to you.”
“H-How do you know my name? Who are you? WHERE are you?”
“We’re…We’re your emotions Riley. We’re inside your head.”
“Huh? You’re…my emotions?”
“Yep.”
“Emotions can’t talk.”
“Well we can. I’m Joy, your main emotion.”
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“How did I start hearing you all anyways?”
“There’s an intercom in here that lets us talk with you as a ‘voice in the back of your head’. Anger decided to do a hockey demonstration on it, and, well, here we are!”
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“But I don’t want to have it fixed….I want to know more about you guys. I mean, what’s it like in there?”
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“RILEY! IT’S YOU! It’s you, it’s you, it's you! It’s you, and you’re here, and…”
---
“It’s a core memory!”
“But it’s white.”
---
“When I’m here, I don’t need you guys to express emotions. The white core memories must be because I can express emotion on my own while I’m here.”
---
Joy smiled. Everything had been so beautiful those first days and nights. Sure, there were parts that were…inconvenient when Riley became scatterbrained for renovations, but it was still fun being able to talk to and show Riley all the wonderful things they had in her own mind. To truly feel like Riley wasn’t just someone they were watching over, but a real person to communicate with.

That caused Joy to frown. Thinking about how it all went downhill from there after they went back to school.
---
“Who’s Disgust?”
---
“Is that idea bulb still plugged in?”
“Yes..?”
“Unplug it. Get it out of my head. Now!”
“I’m sorry Riley. We just wanted to help.”
“I know. But it was my idea in the first place.”
---
“You’re Crazy.”
“I’m not. I’m NOT Crazy.”
---
Joy then felt herself choking up a little thinking about Monday night. It hadn’t been easy when they told Riley the truth of what was going on inside her mind when they first moved.
---
“Joy? What are they talking about?”
“Remember when you moved to San Francisco? We had a lot going on in here.”
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“It wasn’t your fault Riley.”
“YES! IT! WAS! It was all my fault..It’s…I shouldn’t have run away…”
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“I do feel mad at you…But I don’t hate you.”
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Joy winced thinking about those words. Sure, Riley didn’t hate them, but she clearly didn’t trust them as much after that night. After all…
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“Riley locked us out.”
….
“I just wanted to try to do things my way today.”
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“I hate my life.”
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“Does that core memory LOOK like it can help Riley!?”
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“Riley’s locked me out no matter what I do, and with the Core memories gone it might just get worse. The least I can do is get back what she lost.”
---
“Don’t worry Riley. I’ll do whatever I can to fix this.”
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“She wants to stay here, Joy. She wants to remain in her mind…forever.”
“But the only way she could do that is if she…”
“If she never wakes up.”
----
Joy really wasn’t happy about what happened after that. Since she still had three more core memories to find by that point, and needed to find a way to get Isolation Island out of Riley's conscious mind, she’d taken the rest of the night and into the next day as well to locate them all. All the while, she was forced to hear islands shake, watch the lights go on and off. See the sky darken or go gray at different times. It was even scarier than the first time she got separated from Headquarters with Sadness.

Then there was the confrontation that came the next night. Joy finally had the core memories she needed, returned to Headquarters, and confronted Riley about her secret plan in front of the other emotions. And that was when everything went so very wrong.

Chapter Text

Chapter 2: All Fall Down
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Joy had kept very quiet during the train ride back to Headquarters. Nobody could explain it, since they’d always known Joy as the chatty one. It also made the other emotions uneasy as Joy was always the first to have some big idea to fix up Riley. As they pulled into the alcove, everyone disembarked. And as Disgust stepped off last, Riley turned around, looking at the train. She raised a hand towards it, and a white light began to come over the train, before it stopped glowing. “Not yet.” she muttered. “There’s still so much to do.”

Quickly turning around, Riley moved into Headquarters. While the other emotions were whispering to each other about one thing or another, Joy was standing by the central pillar, reaching into her new paper bag for the core memories. “Hey Joy,” Riley suddenly said. “Are you sure the core memories still go there?”

A hush fell over everyone, as Joy paused with her hand holding Honesty Island’s core memory in her hand. There was a serious “deer in the headlights” look on Joy’s face, and she looked down at the memory in her hand to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. But no, aside from being a little dimmer, the core still looked bright enough that it could work as a Core memory. And glancing back at the Core memory holder, it still looked like it had the right number of slots. “I, uh, I don’t know what you’re talking about Riley. This looks fine to me. And I’m pretty sure the others will be too.”

“I don't know.” Riley looked skeptical. She gestured out the window towards the space where islands of personality would normally be. “Look out there Joy. Does it look like they need to come back?” And indeed, there weren’t very many islands left standing. Possibility was there. Isolation was still there somehow. Hockey Island was there. But all the others were either damaged or disappeared into the memory dump.

Joy gave an uneasy chuckle. “Well, they weren’t supposed to fall down during all this, so…of course they need to come back. We all need friends, family, fun and all the rest in our lives.” Riley again gave a glare. “I mean…in a general sense. Not that we’re you, but more that we’re here to do this alongside you Riley. To navigate through life no matter what comes at it. That’s why I tried so hard to save the original core memories in the first place after all.”

“Yeah, and look how well that turned out! Turns out I had to make new ones all over again! It’s almost like everything outside doesn't last and will end up betraying you!”

Joy looked back at the holder. She suddenly felt a deep sense of alarm as it almost looked like the holder was losing slots. Joy took a deep breath, and with a quick movement, plugged Honesty back into the holder. There was still a spot available for it, so it accepted the memory with a click, and shot a golden line back out again. Forming that same Honesty Island she’d had before.

“Why did you do that so suddenly?” Fear asked with mounting unease.

Joy then took a few steps towards the other emotions. “I needed to at least have Honesty Island back before we had this conversation.” She then positioned herself between the emotions and her girl. “You say that everything ‘outside’ doesn't last, right?”

“Yes! Learning! Friends! Parents! Interests! What’s the point in making it all work if nothing ever lasts and they turn on you the moment you start acting differently?!”

“Is that why you want to stay in the Mind World forever?”

A silence as deep as the sea settled over Headquarters at that question. Fear began looking between Joy and Riley with Horror. Anger with shock. Disgust with surprise. Sadness was trying to look neutral, but seemed on the verge of tears. Riley though had a look between guilt and suspicion on her face.

“Joy..I mean, where did you ever get the idea that I’d want that?”

While Joy knew this was going to be a…sensitive thing to reveal given how uneasy the mind workers were about volunteering the information in the first place, she wouldn’t lie even now. “I heard your stream of conscious thoughts when I was in Imagination Land. And the mind workers confirmed it with me afterwards.”

Riley looked like she’d just eaten a sour prune. “They did what?? You’re already inside my head, and now you tried to hear my thoughts without my permission?”

Joy gave a helpless shrug. “They suggested it.”

Riley looked upset, but tried to suppress the look as best as she could. “Okay, well, maybe you heard wrong. What makes you think that’d be something I’d want?”

Sadness stepped up next to Joy. “You told us you feel safe here on Monday night after everything. So you might have a desire to keep that safety for as long as you can if you don’t feel that same safety in everyday life.”

Riley blinked once, twice. “I mean, but if I don’t engage outside, how will I know that my emotions are working properly? You remember what happened when I locked you all out.”

Now Fear stepped up, though nervously wrangling his hands. “That’s very true. Except we all know that when you’re Lucid Dreaming you don’t need us to feel emotions when you’re inside here. It’d be a non-issue. And I’m a little concerned that you aren’t giving us a straight answer Riley.”

Riley took a discreet step towards the mind manuals. “But, didn’t mom and dad say something about needing to seriously go see a clinical psychologist? No matter my own feelings on the matter, why would I need to do something so drastic if I’m clearly going to be prescribed something so everyone can think that I’m normal again?”

Disgust, with her keen eye, saw exactly what Riley had done, and placed herself on the far side of the others between Riley and the shelves. “We all know that the minute someone finds out we’re taking medicine for some mental problem or other, nobody will ever see us as normal again. Ann and Jordan will still be there, but Tracy could have all the power to say she was right to call you crazy. And in only seventh grade, that would become a death sentence for the rest of the year. So yes, it could work. Or, you could want to do something where you’re never seen as crazy by those around you. Like…being in here with us?”

Riley could feel her carefully protected wall of thoughts crumbling, but she made one final plea to keep them off the scent. “Surely I would’ve told all you about this if I wanted to do something like that!”

Anger joined Disgust, also positioning himself between her and the manuals. “Unless you were afraid to have this conversation with us. That after you knew that we made mistakes with your life, you wanted to make sure that we’d never be able to stop you if you could find a way to work around us knowing. That for something as big as this, you’d be able to do it on your own and not have us messing it up or trying to talk you out of it. And I think that’s exactly what’s happening now.” Riley was still clamming up, so Anger took one more step, realizing that to get the truth, he’d have to cross the line. “Isn’t that right, Crazy Girl?”

That did it. Riley’s face curled into a snarl and she unloaded on Anger. “I’M NOT CRAZY! HOW DARE YOU ANGER! After all the trust I put in you the last few days and You’re trying to make me doubt myself?? I can’t be disappointed again! Not after we ran into that problem with “outside projection” that doesn’t seem possible for humans. I’m so worried that you might be schizophrenic hallucinations, and you want to deny your own existence!? I have to believe you all are real, or nothing I’ve gone through the last few days will be worth it. And if the only way I can do that is to be here forever, then I’ll do it!” Riley then caught herself. And now looked quite embarrassed.

All the emotions now looked horrified to have Riley admit this to them all. Joy spoke up. “Riley, even though you were disappointed and upset by all that we’ve gone through the last few days, that’s no reason to think you have to stay inside here forever.”

Riley now looked very upset. “I…maybe I’d believe you on Sunday, but after everything we’ve been through? Everything that’s happened to me? The symptoms of Schizophrenia. Tracy turning everyone against me? Mom and Dad! I..I just can’t deal with it anymore. I need this place to be real, and I don’t want to be out there anymore.”

Fear next stepped up. “You can’t be serious! Riley, the only way to stay here forever might be if you…I don't know, fell unconscious and ended up in a coma. That’s like, my 3rd greatest fear, and..” For a brief moment, Fear shot a look at Joy, and it wasn’t a pleasant one. “Exactly what I was afraid might happen when we started talking to you.” Joy gave a silent wince at the accusation, but said nothing in the moment. “It’s asking for trouble and not what we’re supposed to do for you or what you should EVER do to yourself.”

“But it’s perfect for all of us! Think about it.” Riley began to look over all her emotions. “Fear, in here, you can always be beside me to protect me. And they’ll never be anything new that could be dangerous. Disgust, you can always be here to always make sure I stay away from anything poisonous. And if it’s just us and the mind workers, we’d never have to worry about getting it wrong. Anger, everything will always be fair for me, because it’s always going to be about me.” She paused a second looking at Sadness. “Sadness, we’ll always be together when things get messy, and we can cry together as a family.” And then she looked at Joy, who had a face filled with regret and conflict. “And you know that I ought to be happy, right Joy? This is a beautiful place where we can find all kinds of imaginative, creative, wonderful ways for me to be happy for however long I can be in here. Isn’t that why you’re my Joy in the first place?”

Joy looked down, her mind racing. “This is all my fault. If I hadn’t wanted to talk to Riley as a solution to the intercom’s damage…maybe we could’ve had some kind of…I dunno, medication to help with it? Something that could help from the outside in? But now, Riley just loves it here more than outside. How can I…”

“Riley.” It was Anger who spoke up, looking her straight in the eyes. “We’ll always be here as long as the intercom isn’t fixed, but…you doing this? Trying to be asleep forever?” And Anger then got a VERY serious look on his face. “You’re just trying to run away from your problems again.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Instead of standing up and saying that you won’t be looked down upon, you’re just trying to escape the judgment and fear you’re feeling about what it’s like to know about us.”

Riley scowled. “How can you possibly talk to me like that? Wasn’t running away from home an idea YOU picked out?!”

Anger looked down. “Yes. I did.” Then he looked back up with a fierce determination in his eyes. “And I won’t let you make the same mistake I did. I won’t let you use your anger to justify doing something wrong!” And then, to everyone’s surprise, Anger gave Riley a big hug. Riley blinked a couple times, very confused. “Because we love you. And since you’re stuck with us, we can’t agree to this idea.” Anger turned to look at the other emotions. “RIGHT, everyone?”

The other emotions glanced at each other, trying to figure out how to sort out their own ideas of what Riley was saying. This was way beyond what they ever thought they’d have to face as emotions. Eventually, it was Disgust who stepped up first.

“I admit the idea is…tempting. To never have to worry about broccoli or boogers ever again. But…we exist to be there for you in the challenges on the outside. And I for one do have an interest in seeing who our first proper boyfriend is. Not just someone imaginary like Harry. We can’t find new things we should move towards if we’re all inside your head forever avoiding what we already know is bad.”

Fear came next. “Your mind isn’t any safer than the outside world.” Fear sighed at admitting this. “I originally wanted this to just stop so you couldn’t accidentally hurt yourself, and so we couldn’t hurt you. But…being around you inside here was pretty wonderful. While you could be a bit…reckless, you learned to take care of yourself. And I know that with us working together, we can find a way to be just as safe on the outside as the inside. And…that’s what it means to be brave.” Fear’s eyebrows lowered into a look of determination. “To have fear, but to find a way to use it or to carry on to what needs to be done. If there’s no true benefit to you staying here, then I can’t agree to it either.”

Sadness looked at Riley with big, empathetic eyes. “I know it’s been hard. This has been a bad week for sure. And I understand your desire for isolation more than you might believe. It makes me just want to lie down and bemoan how nobody understands us.” Riley’s expression softened slightly at this. Then Sadness took a step towards Riley, reaching for her hand, though Riley stepped back in response. Sadness looked down very sad at that. “We feel alone and hurt. And that’s not something to ignore. But…you’ve been pushing everyone away as well. Even if we can’t convince anyone, we have to at least try to show how you believe in what’s happening to you. You can’t give up on your Friends and Family after all they supported you through. You have to show them your true feelings about us, and they might show how much they care when you do.”

Riley looked hurt, with her eyes looking at the 4 who just spoke to her. Finally, she looked at Joy. “Joy, please….I just want to be happy again.”

Joy cast her eyes down. And then, in a voice so quiet it was barely above a whisper, she said, “Why don’t you want to be happy on the outside Riley?” She slowly brought her eyes up, and although she didn’t look intimidating, Riley took another step backwards on seeing just how hollow Joy’s eyes looked. “I was made for you to be out there. Not in here, but enjoying everything you experience and love and meet wherever you might go. I was so joyful to see you and talk with you like I once dreamed about, but not at the cost of everything else! Where’s your hope that we’ll get through all this? We endured through the move after our rough first few days. We got through being Scatterbrained. Why can’t you believe that we’re going to get through all these problems and find something better at the end of all this?”

Riley’s eyes wavered. She closed them for a second, and for a moment Joy hoped beyond hope that they’d gotten through to her. But when Riley opened them again, they were hard and angry. “There’s nothing I had out there that I can’t have in here. And I won't be stopped now.” Riley raised her hands, made a pushing motion, and the next thing Joy knew, she and the other emotions were flung back against the ramp to their rooms.

“What are you doing?” cried Fear. “How are you doing this?”

Riley gave them all a hard look. “You may have used the console all these years, but this is MY mind. I’m not going to go through another day like yesterday after all the trouble I got in, and if you won’t help me, then I’m doing this right now!” And with that, she waved her hands again. White light came over the emotions as they suddenly were seated on the couch but with straps on them in various ways.

Joy had her hands and legs bound. Anger was high up on the couch with his head slightly above the top. Sadness had a few straps underneath her legs. Fear was in a full body bind. And Disgust was held in the middle with her legs also held to the couch. The couch was also facing back towards the manuals instead of the console.

“Riley!” Anger cried, his head erupting, but the flames never touched the couch. “You’re trying to suppress us? You stop this right now young lady! You’re in so much trouble, we’ll have to take away dream visits for a week!”

Fear squirmed, but couldn’t slide anywhere due to his “nerve” being held at all places. Sadness couldn’t slip out of her bindings, and Joy and Disgust simply couldn’t utilize anything to get out of their space.

Sadness looked at Riley, a desperation in her eyes. “Riley! What you’re thinking about will probably involve a lot of consciousness tampering. Too much! For all we know, you could accidentally give yourself a brain hemorrhage.” Riley didn’t respond at first, just running her hand over the various titles. “You promised us! You promised you wouldn’t use anything dangerous without understanding it.”

Riley glanced back. “Of course I’ll understand it and be careful. After all, what’s the point of staying here forever if I can't enjoy it?” She grabbed a few different manuals from the shelves, and sat in front of the emotions with the books closed in front of her. “And no matter what you might think, I want to share however much time I get with all of you. I'm sure you’ll come to agree that this was for the best.”

Disgust kept pulling with her wrists. “No! We didn’t ask for this. You won’t earn our loyalty by forcing us to watch you carry it out! Let us go!”

Riley sighed, then went to her first book: Direct Host-to-Mind Interaction. “This seems to be an obvious place to look for something like this.” She opened the thin manual, only to suddenly gasp.

Fear flinched, his eyes looking around headquarters to see if they were about to fall into the dump, but nothing happened. “What’s wrong?”

Riley looked up at them with wild eyes. “I…I can’t read it. It’s all a jumble of letters.”

Fear let out a break of air he didn’t know he was holding. Sadness though gave Riley a firm look. “Even if you’re lucid dreaming, you’re still dreaming. And that means that like in so many dreams, you can’t read because it uses different parts of your brain.”

Disgust then gave Riley a half smile. “It seems like you can’t do anything without us, can you? And we’d never agree to help, so let us go, and we can figure something else out.”

Riley hesitantly closed the manual for a second, then frowned. “This is MY Mind. Even if I have to break all the old rules, I’m going to figure this out. I don’t need you all for this.” She stared at the manual hard, and after a moment of the book shining white, the book looked legible to her. She began skimming through it, bookmarked a page, then set it aside. Next, she did the same to the manual labeled Outside Assessment. Then to Console Construction. Then on Recall Protocols. Then on Advanced Console Operations.

Fear looked over to Joy. His expression was a mixture of terror and, interestingly enough, anger. Which wasn’t too surprising since he could be cross when it came to emphasizing a fearful situation, but he still looked somewhere between hyperventilating and screaming like Anger might. He whispered, “Well Joy, does this answer your question?”

“What?”

“What was it you said when we started this? Oh yeah, If I remember, you were saying something along the lines of, ‘What could happen?’ This turned out great, didn’t it? Riley’s on speaking terms with us, and now we’re going to be stuck inside for however long she manages to stay asleep if she doesn’t die first. Are you happy now?”

Joy felt shocked, and a little frustrated at Fear doing this now. “Hey, it’s not like you had a better idea that night! How were any of us supposed to know things would go in this direction?”

Fear was about to give a retort about just whispering forever, or having Riley tell mom and dad out of fear to get medicine to help fix the intercom from the outside, but Disgust cut him off with an elbow to the side. “Knock it off you two. We can argue about this later.”

They watched as Riley took the different manuals over towards the console so they could no longer see her. However, as she held Host-Mind Interactions in her hand, she looked at the 5 little people inside her head. Her expression was grim. It did make them wonder if perhaps Gloom had gotten under Riley’s skin after their experiences in the Subconscious. Although, she didn’t seem apathetic, but rather darkly sad and determined. “I’m sorry it came to this. I wanted to wait a few more days to put it all together and have you all come around, but you forced my hand, Joy.”

Anger interrupted any remark Joy was about to say, still squirming in place. “We let you see the wonders of your mind. Let you drive trains and fly and fight monster clowns, and you’re repaying us with betrayal? You were always a guest here Riley. You’re not a God meant to stay here forever!”

Riley again looked at Anger with frustration. “I can move machines with my mind. I can fly. I can teleport. I can change my clothes and bring storms. Everyone here is meant to serve my best interests. How am I NOT your God here?”

Anger clenched his fist. Riley had a dark point, but he wouldn’t concede that this plan was right. “You’re not a god. You’re a girl who’s had some bad days and decided that nobody would understand what you’re going through. Just like me, you couldn’t help but let out your anger. But even then you didn’t have the heart to commit to your position. And now you want to do something so extreme it could really hurt you? Stop this madness now before you do something we can’t save you from.” Anger then softened his expression. “We let you in even when we had our concerns, because we thought you’d handle it responsibly. Were we wrong? Aren't you Riley Andersen who loves Hockey, and sees possibilities in every day and night while being a good girl?”

Riley looked down. Again, the emotions perked up in the hope that they’d broken through. Riley then gave Anger a quick hug, but Anger stiffened. This was definitely a hug of anger. If she was carrying a knife, he would’ve probably felt it. She walked over to the core memory holder, and raised it up. And placed a hand on it. “I’m sorry, Anger. But I’m not. This is the only way. And none of you are going to stop me.” And with those words, the central core memory holder spat out Hockey, Honesty and Possibility Core memories.

The emotions were utterly horrified seeing Riley send those cores out. It gave Anger chills remembering how she’d rejected Tragic Vampire, Goofball and Boy Band islands during the day too. But they also knew what this meant for Riley. She was now fully unanchored from her mind since Isolation Island wasn’t plugged in.

Anger though saw that the symbolism given was contradictory. “Don’t lie to us! You know that’s not true. The fact those cores shot out means that you don’t fully believe that. You aren’t being honest with yourself!”

Riley didn’t respond. Instead she walked away, moving the console which was now behind the couch. And the emotions heard no more as Riley was no doubt looking through the manuals to do whatever she was trying to do.

Disgust looked at the other emotions. Noticing how with Anger so high up, there was a little bit of a lean on the couch. And so, Disgust murmured to herself, “Oh, it’s the oldest trick, but I’m going to hate it.” She looked at the others. “Alright. We don’t know how long Riley’s going to take before she manages locking herself in, so follow my lead. Swing back and forth.” Everyone started to struggle, moving the couch, but not causing much change. “No. Together!”

Disgust began swaying against her bonds, and one by one, the other emotions began following her lead, moving the couch back, forward, back, forward, back. And then, it tipped all the way over, tumbling in such a way that it actually broke the straps all at once.

Disgust groaned. "Ow. And yuck."

Immediately, some of the other emotions began picking themselves up, and began running towards Riley, who was looking over the mind manuals, and pressing a few of the buttons in sequence.

“Riley, Stop!”

“Wait. Hold on a…NO!”

It was like the next few moments were in slow motion. Anger, Fear and Joy were rushing at Riley. Sadness was calling out, and reaching for all of them. Disgust was just getting up. Riley was at once reaching for the last console button, and turning her head towards the emotions in surprise. Headquarters was lit up, but no memories had started coming in yet. And then all at once, the emotions reached Riley and threw off the aim of her hand. So instead of pressing Memory Recall, it slipped and pressed a different button.

Riley’s energy self fell to the floor. Fear and Anger holding each of her arms, Joy holding her by the waist in a desperate hug. Then they heard a slight sparking noise. Everyone stopped for a second, turning to look at the console. There were sparks of white lightning starting to dance all over the surface, and it didn’t look like it was stopping.

Riley looked at Sadness. “Sadness…what did I just press?”

Sadness opened her mouth to respond, when suddenly, Riley’s form disappeared from Headquarters. The monitor lit up as Riley seemed to come awake. But then, they saw her form again appear in Headquarters. The emotions looked between the Riley they met inside her mind, and the eyes of the Riley they’d seen through for 12 years. And then, both Rileys suddenly let out a blood curdling scream.

“AAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!”

The lightning continued to arc across the console, but then it began to zap towards the stream of memory orbs that were coming in. And hit the other memory shelves. And both Rileys fell to their knees on their floors.

“Riley!” All the arguing before was immediately forgotten as different emotions ran to try and do different things. Anger ran to try and bring the console back under their control, though he only got zapped back in response. Fear began running towards the Core Memories still in Headquarters. Sadness and Disgust began running up, and Joy knelt down with the energy riley.

“Riley! Look at me! Listen to my voice Riley. What’s wrong?”

The energy riley turned. “It Hurts! My head hurts so much!” But the monitor didn’t respond the same way. Instead, the Riley outside ran out of bed, and immediately unlocked the door from earlier in the evening.

Then they heard mom and dad coming. “Riley!” The door flew open, and there they were. “We heard you screaming, what’s wrong?”

“It Hurts!” the energy Riley repeated. But the body still didn’t say that. At least not initially. They saw it reach out to both their arms, and then the emotions heard five words. Coming from both Rileys. “MY Head Hurts! HELP! ME!”

At that moment, the monitor cut out, as the lightning struck the front space, and they could see no more. The lightning continued to zap out, the console looked like it was beginning to flare in light, and then they heard it. A deep rumble. Anger looked up, and pointed. “OH FLYING PIGS!” The other emotions looked up, and they also felt their panic growing. Headquarters was cracking!

Sadness saw the cracks, her eyes went as wide as saucers, and then she immediately turned to the emotion closest to her. “Disgust, get to the far side of the console! We need to activate emergency evacuation protocols!”

Disgust looked at Sadness in confusion for half a second, then made her way to the side of the console with idea bulbs. Sadness carefully made her way to the other end, then pointed to several buttons. “Press the smaller orange buttons on your side at the same time as I press the blue ones. We’ll press the middle button together. Then as soon as you do, get to the Train of Thought.”

Disgust nodded. Then she looked at everyone else. “All the rest of you, get whatever you can in the next 30 seconds, then get on the train!”

“NO!” Riley tried to stand, but her form was starting to flicker between active and disappearing. “I…I can fix this! I can still….We don’t have to….Aaaaggghhh!!” she collapsed again in pain. “Why aren’t I waking up???”

Joy tried to pull Riley up, only to suddenly get a zap, as it seemed Riley’s energy form was now giving off zaps just like the console was. Throwing Joy off of her.

Fear immediately placed the three core memories on the floor by the pillar and the bag with the other cores still in them. “You heard her. Let’s move!” He ran for his room, wanting to grab his emergency kit. Anger meanwhile ran for the mind manual shelves.

“Joy?”

Sadness was looking at Joy, who slowly stood up near a continually flickering Riley. Shock still, watching as a crack made its way out to The Intercom that started everything. It cracked to the device, then cracked all the way around it. And then, the entire mechanism fell off the wall with a thud as the circuitry behind it became exposed with only a thin wire still connecting it to what was left of the wall.

Joy looked at Sadness, her eyes full of fear and sadness. “What have we done?”

Anger snapped out from the shelves as he hauled different manuals onto the floor. “JOY! Focus. You want to survive this? Get Bing Bong’s bag. We need something to carry as many mind manuals as possible.”

Joy gave a hollow nod, then dashed off to her room. 14 seconds later, she emerged right behind Fear. Both were carrying bags, though only Joys would hold what Anger was hoping for. Joy made her way to Anger, and the two began putting as many manuals inside as possible. Fear grabbed the bag still holding Family and Friendship Island’s cores, also throwing Honesty back in and holding a bag in each hand, ran to drop them on the Train of Thought.

Meanwhile, Sadness and Disgust began typing onto the console even as it continued to glow and spark. Disgust even got a shock from the lighting. At which point she looked over, while making sure to still follow Sadness’s strokes. “How do we know this will even work with the console using so much of Riley’s tampering?”

Sadness gave Disgust a helpless look. “We’ll just have to find out.” Then after pressing a few more buttons, her hand hovered over the blue button under the Puberty alarm. “Okay, now press the middle button with me on three. One, Two, Three!”

Both emotions pressed their buttons, and Headquarters immediately lit up with red light. And from nowhere, a loud voice that sounded like a grown up Riley blared, “Warning! Emergency evacuation has been activated! Please proceed to an open space on your floor close to the outside, and prepare for ejection.” Disgust nodded to Sadness, ran to grab the core for Hockey Island, and made her way to the Train of Thought.

Sadness meanwhile made her way to the Train as fast as she could, as her smaller legs meant she didn’t have the luxury of getting anything else. As she moved through, she briefly pressed a button to begin sending Riley's orbs out to Long Term. And then Sadness called, “Fear? Can you grab as many manuals from near the console? And make sure Riley is with you!” Fear gave a panicked nod, then zipped over as fast as he could to grab two of the manuals.

“Evacuation in 35 seconds.”

Anger and Joy had Joy’s bag of holding in one hand, and a few other manuals in another. They scurried to the entrance to where the train was, setting down some things, while Joy then ran to grab Riley and Possibility Island’s core, racing to meet up with Fear as they moved towards their girl.

“Evacuation in 28 seconds.”

Suddenly, a fault line opened up between the train entrance, Fear’s position and the main part of headquarters, throwing the floor in the air. All the emotions looked over at the still hunched over Riley. Her form pulsing with light, shining off her red and green shirt. Joy was near the fault, her eyes uneasy. “Riley! It’s time to go. Grab Possibility’s core, and we can get out of here.”

Fear also began reaching over. “Riley, take my hand. I’m not leaving until you’re safe!”

“Evacuation in 18 seconds.”

Riley looked up at the two emotions. Her face was a mask of pain and grief, as she slowly hauled herself to her feet, looking remarkably small despite being taller than everyone else. “What have I done?”

“Riley, come on!” Joy and Fear both jumped to get across, but Riley held up a hand, and both were abruptly pushed back.

“10”

Joy looked up. “Riley?”

“9”

Riley looked at the five emotions who she’d come to know so well.

“8”

“I’m sorry.”

“7”

Riley made a pushing move.

“6”

The emotions were flung onto the train of thought.

“5”

They looked up.

“4”

Fear called out. “Riley, we’re all getting out of this!”

“3”

Riley shook her head.

“2”

“Nobody needs me. Not even myself.”

“1”

“NO!”

An air siren sounded, and like a giant slingshot, the train of thought was shot straight out towards the shelves of Long Term memory. On a lower part of Headquarters, a sound like a t-shirt cannon went off, as little people were seen being fired through a tube out the side of the tower. The glass of the window broke, and mind manuals began flying out of Headquarters too.

All the while, Riley sunk to the floor, looking down at the white core memory she’d created. The last memory left in Headquarters. She crawled over, the pain throbbing in her head. She reached for the memory and picked it up, looking at how much fun she’d had during that first in person meeting and use of consciousness tampering. A tear rolled down her cheek. “Why couldn’t it stay this simple?” she mused quietly to herself.

Then the control console exploded in a blast of white light. And as the light grew, there were a few more great cracks, and with a sound like cement breaking in half, Headquarters began collapsing towards The Memory Dump. Riley felt herself becoming weightless, holding onto the core as tightly as she could. The pain was starting to spread through her body. And then…

CRASH!

All at once, everything impacted. The Train of Thought crashed sideways into the cliffside, sending everything flying out. The emotions on the train flew off, books and bags going flying in different directions, and Joy’s imaginary bag bursting open, sending manuals flying out at different angles. Beings from the lower floor began landing near imagination land, near the core 5, all over the mindscape. And far below all of that, Headquarters impacted into the memory dump. It seemed to bob up and down for a second, and then it parted the memory orbs like water, sending it down with their precious girl still inside.

Chapter Text

The emotions gradually shook their heads after being thrown clear of the Train of Thought. Pulling themselves up shakily. But when they stood up, everyone was shocked and horrified at what they saw before them.

Headquarters was gone. There was no white column at all. They rushed over to the edge of the memory dump, looking down into its dark depths. They saw the very top of the building, slowly sinking under the memories, flashing like a sinking ship, and then…nothing.

Joy and all the emotions around her briefly looked at each other, then they all screamed out, “RILEY!!” Their collective cry echoed over the area, but nothing replied.

Joy then stood up, and looked like she was about to jump into the memory dump. But Fear, Disgust and Sadness grabbed her.

“No Joy! You can’t!” hollered Fear.

“LET ME GO!” screamed Joy. “I HAVE TO SAVE RILEY!”

“Joy, Stop!” Disgust held tight as she called out. “You’ll destroy yourself too!”

“SHE NEEDS ME! LET ME GO!”

“JOY!” Sadness was in front of Joy, right in her face, holding her arms, forcing her to look into Sadness’s eyes. “If we’re going to save Riley, we have to follow the manuals! And we can’t do that if we’re stuck in her same situation!” Joy struggled some more, but Sadness kept her eyes on her. “I’m terrified and devastated too, but if any of us disappear down there, we won’t be here when Riley gets better! We’ll be forgotten, and what good will it be if Riley doesn’t remember us then?”

“HOW IN THE MIND’S EYE CAN RILEY RECOVER FROM THIS??? Jiminy Mother Hubbard Toaster Strudel, I HAVE TO FIX THIS!! THIS IS ALL MY FAULT!” And then all the fight went out of Joy as her legs gave way and she collapsed into the arms of those around her. “I….I was the one who wanted to talk to Riley. I made a mess of the move, and I couldn’t help her after she learned the truth. I have to make it up to her! I….I want my mom!” And Joy started weeping into her hands right there, surrounded by mind workers and emotions.

Everyone was quiet. Watching their “leader” cry. For Anger, Disgust, Fear and Sadness, it was a moment of sober pain. Remembering what Joy said about when she landed in the memory dump. For everyone else, it was a shock to imagine the source of their happiness crying. Nobody quite knew what to do next with the shock of everything still all over the mind world. Until at last, Disgust stepped next to Sadness in front of Joy.

Hesitantly, Disgust spoke up. “Joy? We’re emotions. Why do you want a mom?”

Joy slowly worked on calming herself down. Nobody said a word, even as they looked up at the sky as if they expected it to start falling. But, there was enough respect to wait for Joy to explain herself. Even as Joy felt sobs continue to wrack her body. “I…It’s…It’s nothing. I don’t know where that came from.” Disgust gave her a slightly disbelieving look. And Joy felt her tears coming right back. She gave a staggering sigh, then felt the words flow out of her mouth with nothing left to lose.  “I just…I always hoped I could have a perfect family in my life. With Riley and Bing Bong and a Mom and Dad I could please. To make sure I’m doing things right.” Joy sniffed again. “And right now….” She could barely hold it together. “It feels like I messed up too badly to ever get things fixed again. I want a mom to fix this.”

Disgust briefly shot a glance to Sadness, who looked down in grief. Realizing their resident sad person wasn’t going to give Joy something to get herself back on her feet, Disgust knelt down so that she and Joy were at eye level. This definitely didn’t come naturally to her, but she was here, and none of the other emotions would step up. All of them were wondering what exactly Disgust was going to say.

Disgust placed a hand on Joy’s shoulder, so she was looking Disgust in the eyes again. “Joy, you’re taking this way too personally. Sure, you’ve made mistakes at different times, but we all have. And sometimes we do things we can’t take back, like the time we accidentally shoved a plate of broccoli into Jordan’s face.” Disgust cringed at that. They hadn’t spoken to Jordan for four days after that incident. “But don’t forget, we played just as much of a role in what’s happened to Riley as you did, so don’t try to take all this onto yourself.”

Joy looked at her miserably. “But, I’ve always been there to direct you all. I have to make it work. But I can’t fix this like I would normally. I…”

“Joy, Enough. Yes, we’re emotions. No, we don’t have natural parents. But you know what we do have? SIBLINGS!” Joy blinked, not quite understanding what the green emotion was saying. “We’re emotions, but we’re not just a business group. We get on each other’s nerves, we argue, and we get up the next day still ready to get right back to working together. That’s not something anyone would do. Only a family would put up with this much of a mess." Disgust firmly put a hand on her chest to emphasize her point. "It’s why I will NEVER think Mom and Dad are poisonous because I know they’re more valuable than any friend that may or may not last.” Disgust then held both of Joy’s shoulders. “And you and me? We’re going to be doing this work together FOREVER! We’re already your family.” Disgust then gave a serious frown. “So don’t tell your little sister we can’t help you fix this. We're all going to need to pull together to save the most precious person in the family. It’s the only way we’ll get back to something close to normal again.”

Joy shuddered a little. But, took a deep breath and then slowly nodded her head. “Okay. Okay Disgust.” Then in a tiny voice, she looked at the 4 emotions closest to her. “Can I get a hug, please?”

The emotions all almost gave a chuckle to each other, since Joy was always the one who would give the impromptu group hugs rather than receiving them. But they acquiesced and all hugged Joy on the ground. Joy could still feel her tears flowing, but it was a pain that was slowly being dulled. She wondered if this was how Riley felt when she ran back home.

After about 20 seconds, they broke off, and Joy shakily got to her feet. “Okay,” she spoke with a bit more firmness in her voice. “So as long as we’re still here, Riley isn’t brain dead.” Joy caught herself and looked at Sadness. “Right?”

Sadness looked down, trying to remember everything she read. “I think so? It’s the only hope we have until we have more information.” Sadness then looked out over the mindscape they could see. Everything had gotten much darker without Headquarters to anchor the space, but from what she could tell, the only thing that was changing was that the memory dump was starting to slightly expand with tiny rocks falling in spots. “If we’re all here, we can figure this out.” She then raised her voice. “First, I need everyone in this area to gather up all the mind manuals you can find. If we’re going to save Riley, it has to start with us having all the information possible!”

Suddenly, an orange tornado was running all around the area. And before long, stacks on stacks of books were to the side of Sadness. Standing in front of the 5 emotions was…someone. Someone Orange with a puffy stalk of hair, wearing a sweater and semi-formal pants with big eyes and a big mouth that was currently frowning. “Please tell me that’s all of them! I would run into long term memory to search for more, but I don’t want us to waste time.”

Sadness looked over the stacks. “Well this is a good start.”

Joy blinked at the being in front of them. “And you are…?”

The being let out a puff of air. “We’re…not really supposed to meet for at least a year, but with the emergency ejection, I got shot out from downstairs.” She then gave a light smile. “I’m Anxiety. I’m supposed to protect Riley from what she can’t see, although I never could’ve seen something like this happening. But since we’re in a mental emergency, we all need direction to make sure Riley lives long enough for us to keep doing our best for her.” With that, Anxiety gestured out to the many mind workers, as well as one other emotion who were standing there uneasily of various shapes, colors and sizes.

Fear looked at the huge stack of books before them. This was right up his alley too. “Okay then.” Fear then raised his voice. “Everyone who can read, pick a manual and start searching to see if there’s anything that might relate to this situation. If you find something, call it out. If you can’t read, start spreading the word across Long Term Memory that we need to preserve as much as we can. And if anyone finds another manual in your wanderings, please return it to this spot!”

Anger then chimed in. “And unless your eyeballs are literally falling out of their sockets, we can’t sleep until we can figure out next steps. We don’t know how long we have to save Riley, so time is our enemy until we’re done.”

With that, everyone began to move. Emotions reaching for books, mind workers running for Long Term, and a flurry of activity all around. They all knew they had to find something that would point them in the right direction. For Riley.

Chapter Text

Joy flipped through “non-memory recall” in frustration. On finding this manual, her idea was they could find a way to “recall” Riley to their position as an easy way to rescue her, but there wasn’t anything she could find in the book which indicated that was an option. Joy groaned, pulling her hands on her face. It felt like they’d been at this for days. And since they didn’t have Headquarters to check the time against, for all she knew, they could’ve been. Joy then began to reach for another manual, when she felt a hand on her arm. She looked over, seeing Anger.

“Joy, you need a break.”

Joy gave Anger a small glare. “Didn’t you say we had to ‘work until our eyeballs fall out?’”

Anger gave a shrug. “Sure, but you’ve been looking through that manual back to front at least seven times. And you’re repeating yourself. You need a break so you can actually focus when you come back.”

Joy gave a sigh, and set the manual down.

Anger gave a gesture. “Walk with me. Let’s get away from all this activity for just a few moments.”

Weaving past mind workers and other emotions, they made their way to the base of a memory shelf, where there were several chairs set up. Joy gave Anger a confused look, who gave a half grin and just said, “Imaginary chairs. They have everything in there.”

Joy sat herself down. She still felt like a mess, but at the very least, the panic had worn off. She looked off towards the Memory Dump. It still was haunting without seeing the column of Headquarters there. Joy then gave a deep sigh.

Anger sat down on a much more comfy chair next to Joy. “We’re going to save her Joy. We have all the tools we need, and we’ll fix this.”

Joy stared out again, not talking back at first. Then after a few moments, she turned to look at Anger. “How do you do it?”

Anger’s brow knitted down. “Do what?”

Joy gave him an exasperated look. “Look at me. I’m a mess! I haven’t been awake this long since the first time I got sent out of Headquarters. I regret how things have gone with Riley when I only wanted to talk to her. I might’ve accidentally made her like the inside more than the outside. I couldn’t stop her from feeling isolated.” Then she gestured at Anger. “But you? You’re the one who broke the intercom in the first place. Said a few sharp things on Tuesday that made Riley angry at herself. And you’re still moving forward like it’s just another day. We’re in a crisis and you’re being rational about helping me focus again? Why aren’t you feeling the same regret and fear I am?”

Anger gave a bit of a frown. “Do I look like Fear to you? That wiggly wimp is the opposite of who I am.” Joy frowned at this. Anger rolled his eyes in response to the frown. “Part of it is just how I am. I’m a fighter, Joy. That’s what I do for Riley. Push her to fight so that she’s always treated fairly and gets what she ought to have. So if I have to fight to bring her back to her mind or pound some mind problem to rescue her, then I’ll do it. Besides, I have to give her a proper talking to for trying to repress us.” Then he lowered his eyes, and gave a small smile. “And as for the rest? Well, I can’t really be mad at myself even if I’ve had some choice words for the people around us. After all, if I didn’t break the intercom, then Riley would’ve never had the chance to meet us at all. And even though it got messy afterward, Riley thanked me for making that mistake. And I can’t ever regret what happened if our girl thinks I did something good even by accident.”

Joy then swept her hands across the air. “But we could die! Isn’t there some part of you that wishes you didn’t break the intercom?”

Anger then looked down. Joy was surprised at that. “Well, maybe a little. You weren’t there, but we called up the mind workers to see if we could get the intercom fixed. They said they couldn’t fix it with what they had right now, and that if I broke it any more, Riley might start to hear and see things that really weren’t there.”

Joy’s eyeballs shrunk. “That…actually sounds like schizophrenia.”

“Yeah,” Anger agreed.

Joy looked over to Anger. “Well, at least…”

Anger interrupted her. His expression was still angry, but also had a hint of fear to it. “Joy, Riley was convinced that she needed to take antipsychotics to prevent the intercom from breaking any more. She almost wanted to go behind everyone’s back to get it.”

Joy blinked hard at that. “But she didn’t. She wouldn’t!”

Anger sighed. “No, she didn’t. Fear talked her out of it. Convinced her that she had to be safe before taking anything. Heck, Mom and Dad did talk about going that direction with us right before we met up with you.”

“Is that why Riley was so angry about everything?”

Anger grimaced. “Maybe a little.”

Joy frowned. “But…” A thought suddenly struck her. Uneasily, she asked, “Anger, Riley was even more worried that we might’ve been a schizophrenic delusion than when she first learned about it. Did Riley start hearing voices that weren’t us during school?”

Anger frowned. “We..aren’t entirely sure. But…there was an incident with both Ann and Tracy. For all we know, Riley just imagined something we would’ve said, and mistook the imagined thing for us. Yet when Riley heard it…well, she almost turned violent on both of them.”

“I can’t believe this. Ann, you’re siding with Tracy over me?!”

Ann backed a few steps off. Her face was sympathetic, but firm. “This isn’t about siding with anyone Riley. You told me that you’re hearing voices that you can’t stop. Doesn’t that concern you even a little?”

“I said I don’t need help from anyone! Especially not a traitor like you!” Riley pulled her elbow back.

Fear shrieked, “Riley! Not in the hall!”

“You’ll ruin what’s left of your credibility with the others in your class.” Disgust added.

“Or, you could show that no good traitor how you really feel.”

All the other emotions turned to look at Anger in a flash. Anger for his part looked very confused. “That…wasn’t me.”

Riley had curled her hand into a fist, but when she heard Anger say that, a sudden wave of panic came over her. And she immediately dropped her hand. She could feel fear and sadness both pressing a button, but it definitely didn’t make her feel better. “Oh no.” she murmured as she turned away from the two girls. “No. No no no, this can’t be happening to me.”

“You see?” Tracy spoke from behind her. “She was about to turn violent on us. Don’t you get it Ann? Riley’s a danger to us and herself! She NEEDS to have herself checked or taken away.”

Riley turned to look at Tracy. She wanted to scream and use the whole curse word library at once, but she was feeling too many different feelings at once. She didn’t have the energy for it. Her tone was bitter, but resigned. “I don’t expect YOU of all people to understand Tracy. How could you? I bet you don’t even have a shred of Sadness towards me right now.”

Tracy had a wave of confusion pass over her face. Then she frowned. “Ugh. You’re talking crazy again.” Then Tracy gave Riley a disgusted look. “I will do whatever it takes to protect myself from a crazy girl like you.”

“Clearly words aren’t working on a jerk like that. Maybe you ought to show her what happens when she goes against you.”

Disgust blanched. “Riley, that wasn’t ME!”

Riley had raised her palm in the air, a frustrated frown on her face. Oh, how she wanted to act on her anger and disgust right now! But, Fear and Disgust were still right. She couldn’t do this here. And if she was truly becoming schizophrenic, then all she’d be doing is proving Tracy right. 

Instead, she moved her hand an inch, Tracy flinching in front of her. Riley leaned over, and with almost a growl she hissed, “I’M. NOT. CRAZY. I’m tired. I’m angry. You wouldn’t understand it, but I’m NOT Crazy!” Riley then shot a glare at Ann. “And that goes for you too Ann!” Riley then stalked away, but not before kicking the locker behind her in frustration.

Joy blanched. “And…we don’t have any idea where those voices came from?”

Anger shook his head. “We don’t. For all we know, the Intercom really WAS breaking down more.”

Joy sniffed. “I’m sorry, Anger. Maybe if I didn’t leave, we could’ve managed Riley better and found the cores together last night.”

Anger shook his head. “We made the best decision we could at the time. If you had stayed with us, Possibility Island wouldn’t have helped Fear talk Riley down from her bad idea. And I don’t think you could’ve helped with some of the other problems we had while you were gone.” Anger frowned deeply. “Although a part of me wishes I forgot what Puberty actually is.”

Joy raised an eyebrow at that.

“Not the time to discuss.”

Joy sighed. “So, how do you face any regret you might have?”

Anger’s look softened. “I have to keep moving forward, no matter what.”

Joy blinked. “That’s it?”

Anger put a hand on Joy. “If we let our mistakes define us, then we may as well give up now. I know I made a big mistake last year, and I made a mistake last week. But that won’t stop me from going on. I have to. It’s only fair for me, and for Riley that I keep fighting to give her the best life possible. After all, Riley would be terrible at Hockey if I wasn’t there.” He smirked at that last sentence. Joy rolled her eyes at that, but managed a slight smile. The first she’d had in hours.

Suddenly, they heard Fear’s voice come over the area. “I think we found something. Emotions, bring it in.”

Anger gave Joy a nudge. “What did I tell you? All the tools we need.”

As the emotions gathered around Fear, they saw the other emotion Anxiety had pointed out after bringing all the manuals together. This emotion was indigo, tall like Fear, but with long straightened hair, and a sharper nose. She wore dark but comfortable clothes. Her eyelids were open, but she had a bit of a lazy eyed look to herself. She had a fairly large manual in front of her.

“Ah, gather up drama queens.” the being said. “I found something that might help in Mind Emergencies.”

“Drama queens?” Disgust asked. “Look here Miss….”

The being smirked. “Ennui. It is what you call, the boredom.”

Joy gave a confused look. “En-wee?”

“Ennui. It’s French, but it’s more about Riley controlling herself than just boredom.” Ennui then frowned. “But I have to say I’m a bit disappointed that Riley tried to do it herself by locking you all out. My stuff would’ve worked so much better than trying to feel by herself. At least I could’ve brought in a little sarcasm if she wanted to play it cool during the day on Tuesday!”

Sadness gestured to stop Ennui’s rant. “What did you find?”

Ennui then knelt down. “It was in the section on Special Emergencies.”

A Headquarters Collapse is the most dangerous thing to happen to a mind. It will result in unconsciousness for the host’s body. However, depending on when it happens in a Host’s life can change the severity of the problem. For an older host, a collapse could either signal the end of a host's life or some severe physical injury that caused brain damage. In these cases, outside help is required for restarting the mind. For emotions, the best you can do is work on Console Construction (see related manual), and prepare for host reenergizing.

For a younger host, there are several different ways to begin self repairs, as the mind will have more internal resources to resume operations. First is to determine the cause of collapse. As different causes will need different solutions. After determining the cause of collapse, please see the index at the back of the manual in order to determine next steps.*

Disgust and Anger both groaned. “So we have to find manuals to go with this manual??”

Ennui almost smirked. “What did I say? Drama queens.” Before either could retort, she continued. “This manual is our base manual for figuring out what to do next. But first, what exactly happened up there? When we got the evacuation order, we weren’t exactly sure what caused it.”

Fear stepped up. “Riley was trying to mutiny! She wanted to stay in the Mind World forever, and took a whole bunch of manuals in order to do that.”

Anxiety, who’d been very quiet up to this point, already looked like she was about to hyperventilate. “She WHAT?? But, how did that cause a collapse?”

Sadness then filled in. “It looked like Riley was trying to turn her energy self into her conscious self. At least, that’s what I think she was trying to do with all the different mind manuals she picked out. And she could only do that with a LOT of Consciousness Tampering. But when she was going to recall a memory to finish up, I think she might’ve pressed the defuse emotional response button on accident. The system couldn’t handle it, and all that energy caused an overload.”

Fear peaked over Joy’s shoulder, and pointed. “Hey, what was that fine print marker on the page?”

Ennui moved a hand down to look for the footnote.

*For hosts with a collapse or imminent collapse caused by Consciousness Tampering (see Outside Assessment Manual for supplementary information), turn to page 398.

Fear sighed in relief. “Well, at least this manual get very specific about what we need to do. Ennui, can you turn to page 398?”

Ennui flipped towards the back of the manual. Until it landed on page 398.

If Headquarters is collapsing due to Consciousness Tampering, activate Emergency Evacuation Protocols (Advanced Console Operations) IMMEDIATELY . Failure to do so could result in the Host being unable to survive afterwards, or a loss of emotion for future interactions.

Joy looked at Sadness. “Did…did you know about this?”

Sadness looked down. “I read it during the drive from Minnesota. It’s one of those things you never forget.”

Joy patted Sadness on the head. “Well, at least you remembered. We took care of the first step to save Riley without needing to read it.”

Ennui then kept reading. “ After evacuation, follow the instructions below. Order is not specific to the first few tasks, but DO NOT attempt task 6 until all previous tasks are complete for mental stability.

1. Fortify Long Term Memory shelves. Without headquarters to support the overall mind, the memory dump will expand. So ensure the mind workers complete Mind Protocol 1999 to avoid maximum memory loss.
2. Complete console reconstruction (see Console Construction & Advanced Console Operations).
3. Find the host. Due to the nature of consciousness tampering, the host will be stuck in a state of limbo between waking, sleeping and unconsciousness. If the host is not within the Upper Mind, please refer to the manual on the Unconscious to seek the host out.
4. Create a core foundation. This doesn’t refer to Core memories, but any new Headquarters will need mental energy to reactivate. So be sure to have at least 50 memories in the Belief System (see Unconscious) before activating task 6.
5. Regather all primary emotions at console.* (Primary emotions include Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust and Fear. Secondary emotions need not participate, but should be close by in preparation for reenergizing)
6. All primary emotions and the host start the reconstruction process through activation of the new console. Until all emotions and the host use the console at the same time, the mind will not be able to resync with the belief system to begin the reconstruction process. Memory Recall button is best used by the host for resetting energy structure to a point of “safe rebuilding”. Mind workers can then come in to rebuild Headquarters back to a previous setup or to any overdue expansions. This is an ESSENTIAL use of Consciousness Tampering that cannot be performed by any other being. And will require the Host to BELIEVE that this is possible in order to begin.
7. When Headquarters is reconstructed, make sure that Host has removed Emotion Lockout from previous setup (See Console Construction) before reawakening.
8. Complete total mind assessment. This can be done with a general mind worker report in, or via host inspection. It is essential to know all aspects of the mind are ready to function again before attempting repair, or damage to the mind will be permanent.
9. Host must reenter REM sleep in order for their energy self to reconnect with their physical body again. As a reminder, the key is for the host to relax their mind in order to break the old lucid dreaming link.
10. Upon awakening, make sure all parts of the host's body work properly, as mind disconnect may have occurred.

(Note: Host’s connection to past memories may be severed depending on how long the host is in the Unconscious. Restoration of memory is not essential to fixing Headquarters, but if Host asks for a restoration, please see Advanced Console Operations for steps to reconnect Host to Long Term Memory and Islands of Personality. This can be done either before or after step 6.)

Ennui then slumped over backwards, dropping the manual. “Ugh. That was exhausting. Time for my break.” She then pulled out her phone, and began playing with it.

Joy then reached out for the manual. Looking over the many steps, she then gave a bright smile to the other emotions. “I think we have our plan. We have to get the mind workers to enact protocol 1999, make a new console, and find Riley.”

Anxiety spoke up. “For that second thing, what we need is to find the two manuals it mentioned. I know that we had copies on our floor. Did it make it out on yours?”

Anger and Joy looked at each other. Anger then spoke up. “Everything was happening so fast, I don’t know if it’s here or if it got flung out into the wider mindscape.” Anger then remembered something. “Fear, you were the last emotion near the console, and I think Riley used those manuals when she wanted to stay here forever. Did you pick it up?”

Fear frowned sheepishly. “I..I don’t know. I was moving so fast I grabbed the first two manuals I could, then went for Riley. I think I grabbed the basic Console Construction? But I have no idea where the other one went.”

Disgust gave a tired groan. “Well, what was it you said, Anger? Every second counts for saving Riley. So, I say we split up. Some of us will find mind workers to start making a replacement console. Some of us can search for any missing manuals. Some of us can start telling the Forgetters and others about Protocol 1999. And some of us can find Riley.”

Anxiety raised a hand. “I’ll start spreading the word about Protocol 1999. As you can see, I’m clearly the fastest of everyone, so I can start saving Riley’s memories the quickest. Then I’ll see if I can find any other mind manuals along the way. But just in case, will you all be working on the console here when I finish?”

Sadness shrugged. “If we’re not here, I’m sure it’ll be easy enough to find us with how fast you move.” She then thought of something, and ran to grab a manual, which she handed to Anxiety. “Use this to navigate Long Term Memory. It has a guide to finding different parts of the mind depending on where you are in Long Term.”

Anxiety nodded. “Don’t worry. I’ll get it all done. I’ll get protocol 1999 all over the mind, then I’ll find the lost manual, and Riley will be good as new in no time. And after that she’ll get better, and we’ll find a way to turn her friends onto her side and avoid being locked up in an asylum, and…”

Joy cleared her throat. “One thing at a time Anxiety.”

Anxiety nodded uneasily, then took off straight into Long Term. As her form disappeared, the other emotions could faintly hear her calling out, “EMERGENCYYYYYY!!!”

Sadness looked at everyone else. “Who wants to figure out where Riley is?”

Joy and Fear both spoke up at once. “I’ll go find Riley.” They both looked at each other. They both narrowed their eyes. “No, I’ll do it. I have to do this. It’s the only way I’ll make up for messing up…okay this is getting weird. Stop copying me!”

Disgust slapped her face. “If both of you are so passionate about it, why don’t you both find where Riley even is.”

Fear gave an uneasy nod. “That’s fair.”

Joy gave a slight smile. “Two heads are better than one after all.”

Sadness then spoke up. “Joy, do you want me to work on making a new console, or look for lost manuals? I could work in either space, so I don’t know where I can be used best.”

Joy looked at the stack of Mind Manuals that hadn’t been opened yet. “Why don’t you, Disgust and Anger finish looking though these manuals to make sure you have what you need. Then you can go look for any manuals you still need, taking whoever you want.” Joy then glanced over at Ennui. “Ennui, do you…want to supervise console construction when they get started?”

Ennui gave Joy a lazy look. “Eh. Whatever.” She raised her phone up briefly. “Although, shouldn’t you all make sure we all know what’s going on with each other? I’m not giving up my phone, but we should keep in touch when we split up.”

Disgust frowned in annoyance. “That…makes perfect sense. But without Headquarters, we can’t exactly reach out to each other very easily.”

Joy tapped her head briefly, then brightened. “But the mind workers will probably have something.” She looked off towards Dream Productions, which surprisingly still had its lights on, and to Imagination Land which…didn’t look great. “I’ll go check Imagination Land for anything that might work.”

Fear chimed in. “I’ll come with you.”

Disgust then spoke up. “I’ll see if there’s anything in Dream Productions.”

Sadness looked at the manuals. “Anger, you want to see what we can find here?”

Anger growled, but shrugged. “Might as well.” He then glanced at Ennui. “At least until Boredom here finishes her break.”

Ennui rolled her eyes. “Don’t rush me.”

Joy looked at Disgust. “As soon as you find something that might work, come right back here. Then we can move on with the plan.”

“Yes Joy.” Disgust said without preamble. Then she began making her way towards the studio.

“Come on Fear.”

And with that, Joy and Fear were off too. Sadness and Anger meanwhile returned to the stacks. Brushing their hands over the spines, trying to find anything on Console Construction.

Chapter Text

Chapter 5: Mind in Motion

Disgust hurried into Dream Productions. Looking around, she could tell something weird was going on. There were plenty of mind workers coming in and out of the area, but they seemed to be running into each other. As if they wanted to be somewhere, but were unsure where that place was. Two of the sound stages were glowing, while another had gone dark. Some mind workers were running with tools. Some with set pieces. It looked like chaos.

Disgust then got bumped into. “Hey, watch where you’re…” then she got jostled again. “Knock it off!” Finally, after at least 6 more bumps, she finally made it into Sound Stage A. She took some deep breaths, finally having a moment to herself. Then she looked out to the set that looked like it was trying to put together a dream. Disgust tilted her head slightly, trying to figure out what was going on. The dream workers looked like they wanted to dress up like the emotions, but then they were in school? It was very confusing. Disgust began walking towards the set. Then she saw the director Paula coming at her, a bullhorn in her hands.

“You!”

Disgust pointed at herself. “Me?”

Paula raised her bullhorn in Disgust’s face, and shouted, “THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT! IF YOU JUST LISTENED TO ME AND DIDN’T HAVE RILEY LUCID DREAM, THEN NONE OF THIS WOULD’VE HAPPENED!”

“Okay, Okay! No need to shout it in my face!” Disgust slowly lowered the bullhorn down from her face. She quickly touched her hair. It was a little frazzled, which only made her wince more, since now she looked even MORE like broccoli. So she patted her hair down slightly, adjusting herself. “Maybe pulling the manager card was a little haughty of me since you’re all on the ground of what goes on in Riley’s mind.” Disgust then got down to Paula’s level. “But can you honestly say that you and your teams weren’t happy to have her come down here and see her face to face?”

Paula opened her mouth, then closed it, then looked away. “Well, okay. That’s true.” Paula then turned back still with an upset glare. “But it also made my teams lose so much work! We had so many dream plans while Riley was here, but all this Lucid Dreaming meant we had more nights off than normal! Some of the crew was starting to get disgruntled on how long they hadn’t gotten to make a new dream, or even use the same dreams we’d hoped for at the start of the night. And don’t get me started on emergency dreams we had to throw together when she went back to sleep! Hardly our best work!”

Disgust sighed. All their work at Headquarters only seemed to get more complicated the more they left it. “Well, once we save Riley, we’re going to change things. Anger already talked about making Riley sleep normally for a week as a kind of punishment for trying to suppress us. I’m sure Dream Productions can get into a new rhythm when we figure out a new system for how often Riley can come down here.”

Paula let out a sigh too. “I think we’re all scared right now. That's why I got so mad. All the studios are trying to figure out if we can break the lucid connection to restart Riley’s mind or get her out of wherever she is right now. We’ve tried some different dream layouts. We tried turning off the camera. Studio C wanted to experiment with a remake of I’m Falling Down a Deep Pit to see if we could scare her awake somehow. We’ve tried reapplying the reality filter a couple times, but nothing seems to change. And we’ve had a few filters break for reasons we can’t quite figure out.”

Disgust frowned. That could be a problem. “How many reality filters do you all have?”

“Oh, plenty. Reality is easy to change depending on what Imagination Land sends us during the day. Although, our extras weren’t really replenished yesterday.” Paula nervously looked back at the camera. It had its filter off right now, but a mind worker was fiddling with the camera as if he wanted to put a new one in.

Disgust nervously let out a breath. It seemed that Imagination Land really did have a lot of influence on what Riley wanted or could do in other parts of her mind. “Well unfortunately, we don’t know if that’ll help. Riley’s currently lost, but the manual on Special Emergencies said that she’s in a limbo state between waking, sleeping and unconscious. My guess is she’ll need to break her own lucid dream rather than be pulled out by Dream Productions.”

Paula looked down. “So there’s nothing we can do?”

Disgust straightened up, giving Paula a look of command but also sympathy. “Actually, there are two things you can do. First, I need to know if you all have anything to stay in contact with other parts of the mind. We have an idea how to fix this, but we’ll need to talk to each other as we go.”

Paula put down her bullhorn, thinking to herself. “Well, Dream Productions is normally pretty self contained. Our headsets only work within a pretty short distance of each other. But…there was some discussion from the construction crews about building a studio D & E for more “nostalgic” dreams. There might be some construction worker walkie talkies you can find to use over there.”

Disgust nodded. “I’ll swing by that area to take a couple of both. The headsets will be useful when we’re rebuilding a console, but the walkie talkies will be great for if we get farther away.” Then she held out a second finger. “More importantly, could you tell your crew to start working on Protocol 1999?”

Paula stopped. She looked Disgust in the eyes. “Protocol 1999? Are you sure?”

Disgust was a little creeped out by the sudden shift in tone, but she pressed her lips together. “Yes. The Manual said the first step is to enact Protocol 1999.”

Paula frowned. But then picked up her bull horn, and turned back to the studio. “EVERYONE, PRODUCTION IS TEMPORARILY CANCELED! GET TO THE OTHER STUDIOS AND TELL THEM TO BEGIN PROTOCOL 1999 IMMEDIATELY! IF YOU RUN INTO ANY CONFUSED WORKERS, TELL THEM TO DO THE SAME!”

The dream workers all paused. There was the sound of someone dropping a hammer, and then they all ran for the studio door. Some were still holding their tools. Some had picked up some set pieces. Some had ropes between them. But before long, only Disgust and Paula were left in the now empty studio.

Disgust then looked at Paula in shock. “Just….what does protocol 1999 mean to you all?”

Paula gave a cheeky grin. “Since the protocol is about preserving as much of Riley as possible, our team is going to work on creating safeguards to protect Riley’s mind from The Memory Dump until it’s fixed.”

“How?”

Paula smiled even wider. “No, I think I’m going to surprise you as we work. Just know that we’ll do our part to have Riley ready to dream again when this is over.” Then she handed over her horn to Disgust. “Here. You can use this if you need to move a crowd of mind workers quickly.”

Disgust gave a very confused look. But then shook herself to refocus. “Okay. I’ll…go over to Studios C, D and E now. Thank you.” Holding the horn close to herself, she stepped outside to find…a flood of mind workers all moving in different directions. She even noticed Rainbow Unicorn running around with a crowbar in her hooves, prying open a crate. Sighing in exasperation, Disgust raised the bullhorn up. “CLEAR A PATH EVERYONE! DISGUST HERE. AND I NEED TO REACH THE NEW STUDIOS! ALSO, KEEP WORKING THAT PROTOCOL 1999.”

The crowd parted like the waters, and Disgust followed an open pathway towards the far side of Dream Studios. At least she could get back to the others with successes to show for it.

Joy was seriously concerned about Riley’s mental health as she and Fear made their way through Imagination Land. If the land was burnt and messy last night, it looked positively awful right now.

Coming in from the backside, Storybook Land had mind workers chasing down what looked like assorted monsters. Cloud Town looked all stormy and black. The card towers were all knocked over. And from where they could see the far side of it, the french-fry forest had all been cut down. And what’s more, there hadn’t been too many mind workers running around. Presumably, a lot of them had moved out due to the Protocol, but the ones they did see were running off far enough away from them, they hadn’t managed to stop one for help yet.

Fear gave Joy a glance as they walked to the stream of consciousness. Stopping by the banks, they noticed it seemed a little lower than normal. Fear then knelt down, before pulling out a ruler.

Joy blinked. “Where did you get that ruler?”

Fear glanced over at her, before gesturing to a black bag on his back. “I grabbed my emergency kit before we took off. It’s useful when you’re dealing with unusual situations.” After a moment using the ruler, he stood back up, giving Joy a nervous look. “It looks like the stream is at least 4 inches lower than normal. I think this means Riley’s mind isn’t thinking as fast as before. We are definitely on the clock.”

Joy nervously rubbed her hands. She had a question on the tip of her tongue, but she was afraid of what she was going to hear when she asked it. Fear looked over to Joy, raising an eyebrow.

“Whatever you want to say, say it while we’re moving towards Trophy Town.” They started down the puzzle piece path, walking in silence for several moments.

Joy finally cleared her throat. “Fear, do..do you blame me for this mess we’re in?”

Fear stopped in his tracks. His back was still turned to Joy. “Do you know what I wanted to say to you before you talked to Riley the first time?” Joy shook her head. Even though he didn’t see it, Fear continued. “What I wanted to say was that I was afraid that this could go wrong and put her in a coma. And what has happened to us?”

Joy shakily replied, “We’re…in a coma?” Fear didn’t reply at first. “So you do blame me?”

Fear then looked back at Joy. He definitely had a frown on his face, but he didn’t look angry like back on the couch. “Joy, why didn’t you listen to me? This was my third worst fear for Riley after the intercom broke, and instead of avoiding it, you jumped right into it. Why did you break the illusions Riley had about us in her head?”

Joy met Fear’s gaze, but she definitely was feeling a mix of emotions. Shame, but also some of Anger’s fire. “I did the best I could with what we knew at the time. You knew why I needed to do it.” Fear opened his mouth, but Joy cut him off. Growing louder as she kept going. “What would’ve happened if Riley ever managed to hear us while we whispered at the console? She might not have adjusted to the idea of us, and panicked into doing something without ever listening to us. And what if we destroyed the intercom? Then next thing we know, Riley might’ve gotten ACTUAL Schizophrenia. And you would’ve never been able to handle hearing voices that weren’t even us All the time.”

Fear’s brows shot up. He opened his mouth to reply, then shut it. His eyes darted back and forth, and he turned to keep walking, but kept talking too. “Well, you’re not wrong.” Then he paused for a moment. “Do you know how hard it is to be me sometimes, Joy? The rest of you usually don’t second guess your actions. But me? I have to think about everything out there that could be a problem for Riley, and depending on the day, that can be a lot. A good day for me is Riley reading a book with gloves on. Maybe even another of the Tragic Vampire Romance series. But we all know that she’d never go that far. So I have to keep interjecting myself to try and keep Riley away from worst case scenarios. Even if she thinks her wildest dreams are on the other side. It can get so frustrating when you or Anger push past me and then Bang! We’re running away from home or falling over during hockey, or losing our Joy in the middle of the day!”

Joy frowned. “I suppose you’re right. I have led you all astray a few times.” She pondered for a moment, then brightened up. “But don’t forget Fear, even when you’re the most cautious, you are good for catching us before we fall. YOU saved Riley when she forgot how to fly on Monday night. And Anger told me what you did for Riley after I left Headquarters.” Joy then smiled. “So thank you, Fear. You’ve probably saved Riley’s life several times just since we started talking to her.”

Fear paused again, then sighed. “The truth is, I don’t really blame you, Joy. Or even Anger. This was all one enormous accident that got out of control. One we couldn’t even fix once we tried.” Fear then turned with a half smile. “And even if Riley is a trouble magnet, I..I did like having her come see us. Just because I get scared doesn’t mean I hate everything with the slightest bit of danger. Or we’d never have a life.” He then looked sad. “Being in this situation has me worried that I did something wrong. If there was a place where I could’ve stopped Riley somehow. Changed her view of us. Cut her off somewhere.”

Joy shrugged. “I’m sure there are areas where you could’ve rethought your words a bit. Maybe if you weren’t so worried about Riley hating us, she wouldn't have been so tense the last few days.” Fear grimaced at that. “And don’t forget, this wasn’t caused by neglect. You didn’t try quitting like when you three were in charge of Headquarters.”

Fear flinched. “When did you hear that?”

Joy gave Fear a disappointed look. “Disgust told me a few weeks ago on one of my breaks during that scary movie we saw.”

Fear drooped HARD. “Yeah, that’s definitely my worst moment. And it’s why I didn’t talk about it with Riley on Monday night. She’d have HATED me for trying to leave her when she needed me to keep Anger in check.” Fear looked down. “Although, I think I might’ve subconsciously wanted to find you. That by going off, I might’ve been able to find you wherever you were...Or I just got too scared to keep dealing with losing all the islands. That’s also possible.” Fear then looked at Joy with a twitch in his single strand of hair. He looked very sad and nervous. “I..I’m still scared that she hates us deep down. I wish I could believe her when she kept talking about caring about us, but it feels all wrong after she locked us out and lied to us.”

Joy gave Fear sad eyes. “You saw how sad and hurt she was during the collapse. Our girl looked just as broken as I felt afterwards. Just like when she blamed herself for running away. I think…” Joy suddenly put it together. And her expression turned fearful as well. “I think she might be angry with herself. There’s so many times Riley thinks she has to be perfect, and every time she makes a mistake, she’s so hard on herself for ‘failing’ those who expect things of her. Something I might’ve accidentally planted in her mind during the move. And then it just got worse when she tried to change herself and ended up only causing herself more trouble? She must’ve felt like she let us all down, and pushed us away.”

Fear’s eyes widened. “That...makes too much sense.” He then looked at Joy in alarm. “But if that’s true, how can we save her? How do we pull her back to consciousness and the outside if she feels like she let everyone down both inside and out?”

Joy didn’t respond right away. Looking at Fear, she gave a quiet reply. “I don't know.” She slowed down as they walked past what was left of Cloud Town. “I suppose we’ll have to figure that out when we actually find her.” Then she looked at Fear with a fire back in her eyes. “But don’t forget what you told Riley before the collapse. That you wanted her to be brave despite the…well, you. So we’ll just have to keep going forward no matter what to fix this.” Joy’s expression became more thoughtful. “I can’t believe you actually said that.”

Fear gave a sheepish grin. “It’s one of those things I’ve been thinking about the last few days. I was so terrified of Riley hearing us, I didn’t sleep at all that first night. But the second night? I think I slept more soundly than I had in years.” Fear then smiled a little bigger. “I think part of it was I did a good job protecting her on the first night inside, but I also realized that if I didn’t think about some positive futures, I’d never sleep again. So I needed to take that fear, and tame it with knowing that I could help her through.” Fear then scratched the back of his head, looking quite embarrassed. “I guess…I sometimes want to be like you, Joy. Someone who can look at the future and see not just the dangers, but the way forward. I think that’s why I tried so hard to be like you after we moved.”

Joy looked flattered at what Fear just said. “Oh. Uh, thank you.” Then she smiled back. “But don’t be just like me. After all, you’re you. Okay?” Fear nodded. Seemingly in better spirits. “Alright. Now how about we find some way to talk with the rest of the mind?” And they made their way over to Trophy Town.

Disgust poked her head into Studio E. After grabbing a bunch of headsets from Studio C, she was now here seeing if she could find those long range walkie talkies that Paula mentioned. The studio was still being roofed, but the walls were up, and there was still some scaffolding around it. She made her way towards the back of the area. In the distance, she noticed a resting area on some of the scaffolding. And on top of it, walkie talkies. Disgust gave a satisfied smirk. “Bingo!”

But as she got closer to the scaffolding, she frowned. It looked like there were a few sets blocking the way to the ladder. A couple tight holes to crawl through, and the ladder itself was more than a little small for her to climb safely without worrying about breaking it. Disgust let out a groan. “Come on! How am I supposed to reach everything if I’m too tall?”

“Hey! Don’t say that. I would die to be as tall as you.”

Disgust looked around, then looked up at the roof. Right near where one of the extra tall ladders was leaning against the wall, there was a small teal being caught on a plank dangling off the hole in the roof. Suspended above the ladder, but seemingly stuck. As Disgust moved closer, she noticed this girl had a light purple dress, hair that went out in two different directions, and slightly larger eyes than even Fear.

Disgust raised Paula’s megaphone up to shout up to the being. “Uh, who are you, and how’d you get stuck up there?”

The little girl squirmed. “I..I got stuck after I was flung out of Headquarters. I wish I wasn’t so small, or I wouldn’t have bounced off the roof to get hung over this hole!” Then she saw who she was talking to. “Oh! Disgust! I always wanted to meet you one day. You’re the prettiest emotion I’ve ever wanted to be like.” And then, the girl piped in one more thing before Disgust could respond to that. “I’m Envy! Can you PLEASE get me down?”

Disgust looked more than a little uneasy due the height she’d have to climb. Then she looked back at the walkie talkies still so far out of reach. She sighed. She didn’t have any immediate ideas on how to get through, so she set everything down and started climbing.

It took a bit of time. Not so much because it was that high up, but Disgust had to stop every couple seconds to shake out her sweaty hands or complain about the dust as she got higher and higher. Until she finally reached the top of the ladder, and there was Envy, still suspended by her dress.

“You look so much better up close! And your hair…” Envy began reaching for Disgust’s hair.

“Hey!” Disgust snapped. “We are too high up for you to do this now!” She gently reached for Envy, and started pulling. It took a few gentle tugs, but she finally got Envy free and in one of her hands. She gently lowered her onto the ladder. “Also, I’m not carrying you down.”

Envy frowned. “But I…” Then she suddenly got an idea. “Oh, I know! Now that I’ve experienced being shot out of Headquarters, I know exactly what to do to get down!” And with that, the little emotion leapt from the ladder. “GERONIMO!!”

Disgust looked in shock as Envy soared down, until she somehow landed on a slanted piece of wood. The wood cracked on impact, but Envy bounced off it, and landed on the ground before rolling 10 feet and finally coming to a stop.

Disgust hurried down the ladder, making her way over to Envy as quick as she could. “Envy! What were you thinking?? We’re emotions, but we’re not invulnerable! Are you okay?”

Envy hauled herself up, before dusting herself off. Her expression was downcast. “My whole body feels sore. And I feel more than a little upset that I landed on my face when someone else might’ve landed on their feet.” Then she looked up at Disgust with a bright smile. “But other than that, I’m perfectly alright.”

Disgust groaned, placing a hand on her head. “Just…don’t do something like that again.”

Envy then started jumping up and down. “So, how do I get your hair? Huh? Huh? You have to tell me your secret!”

Disgust frowned. “I...was born with it? Honestly, I’ve been trying to change it for the last few days.”

Envy gasped. “But why? It makes you look so stunning. And it goes great with your dress.”

“Yeah? Well, it also makes me look like the worst thing in the universe! Broccoli! Riley just made me realize it, and it’s…oooh, I wish I could just fix it up so I didn’t look like what I hate!”

Envy blinked a few times. “Oh.” Then she brightened up again. “Well…how do you know Broccoli doesn’t look like you rather than the other way around? Then it would be a copy of you, and the most beautiful vegetable in the world.”

Disgust made a gagging noise. Then she looked down at the short emotion with a disappointed look. “You really need to get up to the main headquarters sometime, Envy. Being compared to something you don’t like in a positive way is still being compared to something you should stay away from. I’d just as soon grow my hair out than keep looking like Broccoli.”

Envy frowned. “It was just a thought. After all, you and I are like...cousins in what we do for Riley. I just wanted you to like yourself as much as I do.”

Disgust then looked guilty. Here she was, complaining about her hair, and this other emotion they'd never even worked with before was treating her like she was cool. Disgust then knelt down so she could be closer to Envy's level. “I’m sorry. As you can probably guess, it’s been a hard week.”

Envy nodded. “Yeah. I don’t envy all the work you had once Riley went inside her own mind.” Then she smiled again. “But, you have a plan to save her, right?”

Disgust gave a curt nod. “We need to rebuild the console, find Riley, and make sure we don’t lose our memories in the process. That’s why I came to this area. I was looking for mind worker walkie talkies so we can talk to each other while searching for Riley.” Then she gestured over to the scaffolding. “But now that I’ve found some, I can’t even reach them without moving all this stuff!”

Envy looked over, and she got a bright smile. “Oh! Of course! Wait right here.” And she took off towards the jumble. “Maybe I want to be like you someday, but today..” Envy reached the first hole, and began squeezing underneath a star board. “Today, you’re lucky I’m closer in size to a mind worker than you or Joy.” Then she jumped over a dowel, before climbing onto the wooden board she cracked. She braced herself, then jumped to a circle, which she ricocheted off of, and grabbed onto the ladder up. She climbed and climbed, and before long she reached the walkie talkies. “How many do we want?”

Disgust had watched in surprise while Envy was doing all this, before quietly saying, “All of them?”

Envy let out a whoop of excitement. She scooped them up in her dress, and then leapt off the scaffold. Landing on the star shaped piece of wood and sliding all the way down, before hitting the ground and tripping again, scattering the walkie talkies over the ground. “Ah man! I was almost perfect!”

Disgust couldn’t help herself. She laughed. “You may be Envy, but you’re adorable right now.” She looked over, and saw three walkie talkies. “How did you even carry all these down?”

Envy shrugged. “I wanted to, so I found a way.”

Disgust gave a light smirk at that. “Well, we can talk about hair strategies later. For now, we need to get all these over to the other emotions. I’m sure Sadness and Anger will find you…interesting to meet.” Disgust scooped up the radio talkies and placed them on the inside of the bullhorn on top of the headsets. She lightly shook it, with only one walkie falling out. And after seeing Envy pick up that Walkie Talkie, Disgust made her way towards the exit.

Envy immediately scampered after her. “Hey! Wait up! I’m so much shorter than you, so I have to try much harder to keep up!”

Disgust rolled her eyes. “You want to be Riley’s Envy soon? You'll have to work hard! So keep to my pace. We don’t have forever.” And she exited out Studio E, with Envy rushing to keep up behind her.

Wandering into Trophy Town, the two emotions were surprised to see some mind workers tipping over the goal. While surprised, they moved towards the group, noticing that there were more than just mind workers working on changing things.

Joy stepped forward. “Uh…what are you all doing? Is this a part of protocol 1999?”

One of the mind workers turned to look at Joy. “Protocol 1999? I know we need to preserve Riley’s mind, but we’re going all the way to that now?”

Joy nodded in confusion. “It’s in the manual for something exactly like this.”

The worker looked back at the goal, but then shrugged. “Well, this counts in its own way. We needed to start revitalizing Trophy Town into the Metropolis of the Future anyways.” He yelled over to everyone else, “Take 5. The Emotions are here!” The goal finished tipping over, while workers and imagined creatures made their way forward.

“Joy?” Fear put a hand on Joy’s shoulder, and pointed. “Is that…”

Joy looked at a certain someone coming over. “BING BONG? YOU’RE ALIVE??”

The imaginary creature walked over to them, but he looked very confused and upset. “Why does everyone keep calling me that?? Bing Bong died! He died for Riley, asking for her to go to the moon with his last words? Why does everyone keep saying I’m him???”

Fear and Joy took a closer look at this being, and that’s when they realized that this wasn’t exactly Bing Bong. While he looked pretty close, the fine details were a little off. His jacket was a little bigger. His ears were a little smaller and slightly orange. And most of all, Joy could tell that he didn’t really have any trace of Dolphin in him. They looked at each other in confusion. Then Fear had a sudden understanding come over his face.

“Oh. Riley couldn’t help herself.” At Joy’s confused look, he explained. “When we described what Bing Bong was like, her memories of that night must’ve led to the creation of something close to Bing Bong, but not quite since she didn’t restore the memory.”

Joy grimaced. “Oh no.” She looked at “not bing bong” with sympathy. “I’m sorry. Riley decided not to revive the memory of Bing Bong, but you must’ve been created from her soul memories describing him.” She then lightly smiled. “You’re not Bing Bong.”

The being sighed in relief. “Thank you! Finally someone says that to me!” But then he frowned again. “I still feel like him. I guess because Riley hasn’t really forgotten after her dreams included him.”

Fear scratched his head. “Well, are you okay if we call you Zing Zong or something for now?”

“Zing Zong” frowned. “It…just doesn’t feel right to be anything but Bing Bong. Not Ding Dong or Fing Fong or even Ping Pong. How about, just call me Bing Bong Jr. until we figure this all out.”

Fear and Joy looked at each other and shrugged. Then they turned their attention to the mind workers. Fear spoke up first. “We need something to talk across the mind. Does anyone know of anything in Imagination Land which might help with that?”

The mind workers looked at each other, until one that was a little taller than some of the others stepped up. “I’m Pete. I’m normally a foreman for reorganizing Imagination Land based on Riley’s tastes.” He reached down, and unclipped a walkie talkie from his belt. “No matter how important I might be, you all will definitely need these more than I will. Thankfully, other workers can pick up the slack.” He nodded to Atta and Bobby, who reluctantly unclipped their own radios, and handed them over.

Joy and Fear both nodded gratefully. “Thank you,” Joy said. “Keep up with Protocol 1999, and we’ll make sure to find Riley.” Then she added, “Even after all that happened, you warned me about Riley’s secret plan so we could try to protect her. Thank you, especially to Paula and Bobby.”

The mind workers all gave a nod, and began making their way back towards trophy town, seemingly determined to move the trophies to a new spot. Pete however stayed behind just a moment longer. “With all the moving around going on, you all might need some help.” He looked at the two familiar people still standing nearby. “Harry, Bing Bong Jr. ? Why don’t you two give the emotions a hand?”

Jr. looked thoughtful at the idea, but Harry still looked rather reluctant. “I..I don’t know if I’m ready yet. I still haven’t found my personality fully, and I have no idea if Riley would properly generate me again if I died. This feels too big for any boyfriend to handle.”

Fear picked up the radios, while whispering into Joy's ear, “We can’t afford to pep talk for too long, Joy. You know Riley’s beginning to slow down. We have to get going.”

Joy stepped forward, trying to be a mix of herself and Sadness when talking to Harry. “Well, this is a perfect opportunity for you, Harry. If you want to be brave, then you can prove that you are by coming with us and saving Riley. Then you’d be sure to know how well you’d die for Riley.” Joy then looked at both the imaginary beings. “I know both of you aren’t exactly in good shape right now, but this is a chance. A chance to really make Riley happy. And to show that you’re more than what you were originally made for. What do you say?”

Harry and Jr. looked at each other. But it was Jr. who smiled first. “It’ll be so much fun. And if worst comes to worst, we’ll also fulfill what we were meant to do.”

“What’s that?”

“Make Riley happy. Even if we die in the process.”

Harry scoffed, but then put a hand on his chin. Finally, he sighed. “Well, alright. For Riley.”

And so the new quartet began retracing their steps back towards the plateau between Imagination Land and Dream Productions. Little did they know that two of them would be returning to Imagination Land sooner than they thought, and Joy's words would be far more prophetic than she might've wanted.

Chapter Text

Chapter 6: Into Unconsciousness

Joy, Fear and the two imaginary beings hurried towards the stacks of manuals located between Imagination Land and Dream Productions. Jumping over the old Train of Thought tracks, they scurried to the emotions still there. Anger was shoving a manual to the side with an angry huff, while Sadness seemed buried in another one of them.

Joy hurried in front. “Sadness, Anger! We found something.” Then she realized someone wasn’t there. “Where’s Ennui?”

Anger paused, and jerked his thumb behind them. Following his gesture, they saw Ennui laying the manuals down and angled on top of each other. Jr. gave a confused wave. “Hi. I’m Bing Bong Jr! What are you doing with those?”

Ennui looked up with a glazed over look. “Alphabetizing. In case we need one of these later.” She then gave a groan. “It’s SO BORING though!”

Anger glanced up. “Well, that’s what you get when you decide to slack off while helping. Maybe you can put a little more effort in next time you’re pretending to read a manual.”

Ennui sighed and rolled her eyes. “Excuse me for not being you, colère.”

Sadness then looked up on hearing Jr’s name. “Bing Bong Jr?” She dropped her manual, walking towards Joy, a serious but sad look on her face. “Joy, why is there another version of Bing Bong with you?”

“Riley created this one from her soul memories when she learned who Bing Bong was. But, he knows what happened to the original one, so he asked to be called Jr. until Riley can better define him.”

Sadness gave Joy a scrutinizing look, before leaning in. “Joy, as much as I’m glad to see a Bing Bong again, why are he and Harry with you? And did you find anything that can help with communicating?”

Joy glanced over at the two, who were conversing with Anger and Ennui, working on the mind manuals alongside the emotions. Although Ennui slapped Jr’s hand, seemingly because he wasn’t alphabetizing properly. “We need all the help we can get finding Riley. The head of Imagination Land, Pete, suggested bringing them with us. And he gave us these.” She held up the radios for Sadness to see.

Sadness gave a small but unsure nod. “Alright. We do need all the help we can get. Especially because we might have a lead on how to find Riley.”

Joy opened her mouth in excitement, but then overheard someone speaking up from a distance. “Hey, emotions! You’ll never guess who I found when I was finding walkie talkies.” Everyone turned, and saw Disgust hurrying up with someone short right behind her.

Anger looked at the little girl scurrying behind Disgust. And he suddenly gave an enormous smirk. “Why Disgust! I didn’t know you were bringing home a little sister with you.” Disgust gave Anger a deadpan stare. “What? I’m just glad that I’m not the shortest emotion anymore.”

Disgust rolled her eyes at that. “Really Anger? Priorities. And besides, Envy here was able to grab the walkie talkies we need to talk across the mind.” She held up her megaphone, while Envy was right alongside her, holding up her walkie. Anger raised an eyebrow at the megaphone, so Disgust turned it upside down and the headsets and other walkies fell out. “It was a productive trip,” she proudly said.

Envy for her part made her way towards the other emotions after clipping her walkie to her dress. “Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. It’s all the old school emotions! This is so cool.” She then made her way up to Joy. “And Joy! I just love how you glow. Like the light we’re all trying to reach. I can’t wait to get upstairs to work on improving Riley with you one day!”

Joy glanced down at Envy, then looked at Disgust and her pile of things. Disgust gave a firm nod, then raised an eyebrow at Joy’s walkies in her hands. Disgust then commented, “Well, hopefully we’ll have spares.”

Joy gave a light smile at that. Then frowned. “Sadness, you said you might’ve found a lead on where Riley is?”

Sadness then held up a manual. Fear immediately stepped back. “Oh no. Not…not THERE!” Joy looked back at Fear in confusion. Fear then pointed at the manual like it was a spider. “That’s the manual Sadness used to talk about The Unconscious. Sadness, PLEASE don’t tell me that Riley is unconscious in her own Unconscious!”

 Flipping towards the middle section, Sadness adjusted her glasses, then gestured everyone over. As the growing group made their way over, Sadness read in an utterly serious tone. “ If a host was somehow caught in Headquarters during a collapse, there are several possibilities of where they could be. If a host is able to react quickly enough, they might’ve teleported to a section of the mind they feel most comfortable in. If not, it’s quite possible that they might sink through the memory dump into their Unconscious. But if so, Emotions must do everything they can to prevent the use of Consciousness Tampering while there. The Unconscious is a fragile area of the mind. Any tampering in this area could result in permanent mind damage, and generate any number of issues for the future.”

Fear gasped, gave a tiny shriek, then promptly fainted. The other emotions looked at him. Disgust gave a sigh. “I guess it’s all finally catching up to Fear. Especially after everything Riley’s done in just the conscious mind. If she’s down there…” She gave the other emotions a hard look. And as they glanced among themselves, they all had various degrees of alarm on their faces at Disgust’s implied concerns.

Sadness looked to Anger. “Wake him up. He wanted to find Riley, so he needs to hear this.” Anger gave a serious nod. He walked over to Fear, raised a foot up, and stomped on Fear’s foot.

Fear promptly shot up to his feet. “I’m sorry Mom! I promise I’ll finish our homework now!” Then he realized what happened, and shook himself out with the tiniest bit of grace. However, he also gave Sadness a terrified look. “How do we know that Riley isn’t just somewhere on this level?”

Sadness shook her head. “This said Riley would’ve teleported to a section they were most comfortable, or even knew. You didn’t see her in Imagination Land, did you?” Fear shook his head nervously. “Disgust, did you see her in Dream Productions?” Disgust also shook her head with mounting dread. “Then the best place to look would be The Unconscious.”

Envy walked closer to Sadness, a cautious look on her face. “So, how do we get to Riley?”

“It’s not that simple, Envy. If we go to the Unconscious, we have to be extremely careful how we get out, or Riley’s mind might splinter again under the weight of so many unmanageable things. Complexes, disorders, Gloom. We have to do this carefully, or Riley might lose herself even more than she already has.”

Envy gave an unsteady nod, but gestured to the devices all on the ground. “That’s why these are going to be so important. We’ll have to be very careful not to lose them, but anyone up here can guide those looking for Riley down there with the manuals on hand. So, HOW DO WE GET TO RILEY?” The other emotions also looked at Sadness with nervous expectation.

Sadness stared back at them, then flipped the page. “ Reaching the Unconscious can be done in three different ways. You can reach it through the lowest levels of the Subconscious. You can try to break through the memory dump if your Belief elevator tube managed to remain standing and swim out from there. Or, you can dive down to reach it through The Stream of Consciousness.”

Envy gave a confused, “What? Belief Elevator? I didn’t know we even had that.”

Sadness shook her head. “It’s a later installation once Riley manifests her Sense of Self. We didn’t have it installed yet.”

“Sense of Self?” everyone asked.

Sadness pointed to their Special Emergencies manual. “Remember how the manual said we need memories for the belief system to recreate headquarters? That system will manifest a sense of self once Riley thinks she knows who she is.”

Harry didn’t like the sound of that. “Knows who she is? She’s been going through all this stuff inside her head, and was getting lost! How could she possibly know who she is after all this time she spent with all of you?”

Sadness gave Harry a sad but serious look. “That’s why it’s up to her to figure it out. We can certainly provide the memories she needs, but Riley will know when she’s got a sense of who she is.”

Anger solemnly looked at the manuals they’d looked through. Then at the emotions. Then at what they’d just read. Looking back up, he stared everyone dead in the eyes with a glare that was hard as a rock. “This could be the most dangerous thing we ever do inside our mind. But we have to get down there and get Riley out if we’re ever going to be conscious again.” He looked both Joy and Fear in the eyes. “Are you both SURE that you want to go find Riley like you said before we picked up the radios? There’s no room for second doubts when we start moving into the Unconscious.”

Fear looked like he was on the verge of fainting again, but then something changed. He took a step forward, and looked Anger dead in the eyes. “I HAVE to do this Anger. Riley’s in terrible danger right now! I have to get her out even if we almost drown or die or get lost. It’s what I was born to do! To protect Riley from something like this!”

Anger raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. He turned to look at Joy. “And you, Joy? Are you sure you can handle this?”

Joy also gave a firm nod. “I brought Riley into her mind. I need to bring her out.”

Anger gave a small smirk. “Well, how about that? And here I thought I was the only one with a spine among the emotions.”

Disgust then chimed in. “Okay then. Everyone who’s going down into the Unconscious, grab a walkie talkie.” Joy and Fear both grabbed one, but Jr, Harry and Anger also reached for one. “That…you all want to do this?”

The two imaginary beings looked at Disgust, and both simply said, “For Riley.”

Anger then chimed in. “If the Unconscious is as dangerous as the manuals say, we need a FIGHTER like me to defend against all the stuff down there.”

Disgust groaned. “Well, we can’t have all of you take a Radio. Some of us will still need one or two while we’re working up here to get things ready.”

Jr. promptly handed his walkie to Sadness. “I wouldn’t really know how to use this anyway. I’m only two days old after all.”

Harry thought for a moment, then handed his radio to Disgust. “We’ll probably be traveling in groups anyways, so I won’t need one.”

He didn’t sound entirely confident, so Disgust gave him a slight narrowing of eyes. “And are you sure you won’t turn your own search for identity into an excuse to back out during the expedition?”

Harry gave Disgust a deep frown. “Haven’t you forgotten? I would DIE for Riley. That’s the core of why I was made. I won’t give up just because something’s being made on top of it.”

Disgust stared at him for a few seconds, before changing the subject. “Sadness, do we know which method of reaching the Unconscious is easiest?”

Sadness just shook her head. “The manual doesn’t say. Since you’re not supposed to go in that area, they’re both probably difficult in their own ways. And the Unconscious is a mysterious place in of itself. The Belief System might be an anchor point for you to reach, but in order to get there, you’ll probably end up going through a lot of wild space where all her disorders and gloom still are.”

Everyone shuddered at that thought. Joy then took a second to look between the stairs down to the Unconscious and the way back to Imagination Land. Finally, she took a deep breath. “I’ll dive down through the Stream of Consciousness.”

The other emotions looked with surprise and shock at that statement. It was Fear who spoke up with deep nerves. “Joy, at least if we use the Subconscious, we’ll be walking through familiar things. Things we were able to partially clear up thanks to Riley yesterday. Swimming to the Unconscious? How do you even know you could hold your breath long enough to get there? And what happens if you don’t? The stream runs through most of Riley’s mind. You might end up in a part of the mind very far from normal operations.”

Joy shook her head. “You said that the stream is lower right now because Riley’s losing her thoughts. That means it’ll be less far to get down to the Unconscious that way. We need to find Riley. And that’s the fastest way for me.”

Fear still wasn’t convinced. “Four inches isn’t exactly a huge difference. It’s still not something you can control as much as walking....”

“We can’t worry about control!” Joy snapped. Everyone was taken aback at that remark. “Nothing is more important than saving Riley. I’m taking the fastest way even if it’s a danger to myself. And if I have to dive down alone, then I will.”

There was silence for a moment, but then Jr stepped up next to Joy. “I’ll go with her. I remember Bing Bong once tried swimming the length of the entire mind when Riley was 9. So I can save her if things go wrong.”

Fear still wasn’t fully convinced, but he sighed. “Clearly I’m not going to talk you out of this Joy.” He then held her hands as firmly as possible. “Just…promise me you’ll come out okay. Even if I find Riley first, you have to promise me that you’ll get out of the Unconscious. WE need you.”

Joy smiled a sad smile. “I promise.”

Bing Bong Jr then chimed in. “I’ll make sure of it too.”

Disgust then spoke up one more time. “Joy, before you go…” She then held up the imaginary bag Joy brought from headquarters, and Paula’s megaphone. “You never know what you might or might not need in the Unconscious. So take these with you.”

Joy gave an embarrassed chuckle, and grabbed the bag. “Heh, that’s true.” She then put the megaphone and her radio in the bag. Then she briefly looked at the headsets. Disgust gave her a raised eyebrow at that, but Joy shrugged, and grabbed one, placing it inside as well. Joy  then turned to Jr. “Carry this for me? It’s going to drag when I’m swimming.”

Jr. took the bag gingerly, slinging it over his shoulder. “Just let me know whenever you want it.”

“Alright then everyone. Let’s move out!” proclaimed Anger. He first looked at Joy. “We’ll try to meet at the Belief System. If it’s a fixed point like the manuals said, it’ll be a good place to regroup.” Then he turned to look at the four emotions not going down. “If we make progress, we’ll radio up to you.”

Disgust then pointed to the manuals. “If you ever need advice on ANYTHING, radio us. And don’t leave the Unconscious until we have a safe route for you.”

With that, Joy and Jr made their way back towards Imagination Land. Anger, Fear and Harry meanwhile began jogging towards the Subconscious. As the two groups slowly began going out of sight, Sadness, Disgust, Envy and Ennui briefly made eye contact with each other. All of them looked scared, but they all swallowed at once, trying to hold their unease back.

Disgust then spoke up. “So, did you find the manuals on Console Construction and Advanced Console Operations?”

Ennui chimed in. “Half. We did find a mention of Pituitary Assembly in the basic manual of Console Construction if we wanted to start making new consoles, but we still haven’t found any manual about Advanced Operations yet.” She then gestured to about 10 remaining manuals. “And we’ve almost gone through everything from Headquarters that was on the Train of Thought.”

Envy then spoke with a serious demeanor that was almost unnerving coming from someone as small as her. “Where is the Pituitary Assembly?”

Sadness pointed out past the Memory dump. “If I remember right, it’s on the other side of the dump. Somewhere between the second deja vu and language processing.”

Disgust and Envy both immediately groaned. Disgust speaking first. “Getting there is going to take WEEKS! Ugh, where’s Riley when you need to fly across the memory dump??”

“Why fly, when you can walk?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, you can’t walk across…” Disgust suddenly realized that Paula had said that. She turned to look at Director Paula, who had walked up smiling like a Cheshire Cat. “You can’t walk across an open pit.”

“You can if the mind is in the throws of Protocol 1999.” Paula pointed towards Dream Productions. The sound of a catapult launching was made, and what looked like a long Tarp flew halfway across the dump. Then something sounding like a plane engine went off, and what looked like a dragon flew out from the tarp, heading towards the other side of the dump, carrying one end of the tarp in its claws.

Ennui looked half impressed, but then looked bored again. “That will collapse the second someone steps on it. How can that be safe to go across?”

Paula then pointed to the near side where mind workers were hammering on the material in different ways, trying to secure it even as the dragon continued to fly across. “We’ll secure it. We need to in order to make sure the memory dump doesn’t expand while Riley’s unconscious. And to prepare for phase 2.”

Sadness looked at Paula with unease. “Paula, you don't think this is a good idea, do you? I said the same thing to Joy when she tried to walk on Goofball Island back to Headquarters. It’s too unstable and dangerous.”

Then something happened that nobody expected. What sounded like a male adult voice drifted over the mind. And all five beings stopped and listened. “ If Riley ... .any signs of an artery rupture, then….operate….the only way to protect ... .from any….lethal effects ... .if….symptoms are clear…have to move fast to save Riley’s life.”

Disgust immediately shuddered in alarm. “An operation? But surgery gowns look so tacky!” She then looked at Sadness. “Whatever’s going on out there, it sounds pretty serious. Is this why you were so worried about Riley getting a Brain Aneurysm?”

Sadness gave a worried nod. “Riley’s mind might’ve accidentally caused a problem when everything went haywire. If she actually hurt herself somehow, then Riley’s in more trouble than we originally thought.” She closed her eyes, and when she opened them, she had the same kind of serious look Anger had only a minute before. “We have no choice. We have to keep going or Riley might become brain dead. We need her dream self, but we should have the console ready when they find her, so we can get her back to normal sleep rather than this limbo state.” She looked at Disgust. “Can you make it all the way to the Pituitary Assembly to let them know we need a replacement console?”

Disgust looked at the tarp. A second one was now being carried across by a giant butterfly animatronic. “I…I don’t want to do this. It’s so gross and dangerous. Even if I make it all the way, I don’t know if I’ll have the nerve to come back the same way. Even if there’s a host of mind workers behind me!”

Envy grabbed onto Disgust’s leg. “What if someone came with you? Someone who’s light enough that it won’t make as much a difference if you’re carrying them or they’re going alongside you? Someone who wants a modified console so something like this can’t happen again? Someone who…”

Disgust glanced down at Envy, giving her a deadpan look that quieted Envy, before picking Envy up off her leg. Disgust still didn’t know how to feel about this future emotion getting so attached to her. Then she remembered someone who wasn’t there but could be. “Why can’t we just wait for Anxiety to come back? She’d probably run across there in no time flat.”

Ennui gave Disgust a skeptical look. “You want to risk everything on how fast Anxiety can run through long term and back to us?” That question hung over everyone. Finally Disgust sighed.

“Alright. For Riley I guess.” She looked over at Paula still standing there. “You promise that you’ll keep it tight when we cross?”

Paula nodded. “And if something happens, we’ll swoop in to get you. It’ll be our finest production.”

Disgust cringed at the thought of getting stuck down there like Joy was, then looked at Envy. “Alright you little teal emotion. We’ve got a long walk ahead.” She then began walking off with Paula towards the chasm, still holding her radio, but picking up another headset as well on the way. Envy took a step towards her, then stopped, as if thinking of something. She tossed her radio to Ennui, then scurried off after Disgust. “Can I hold the Radio? I want it!” She chimed as she chased after Disgust.

Sadness looked over the remaining unsorted manuals, then looked at the last emotion left in their space. “We better hope Advanced Console Operations is in the last few manuals, or we’ll have to go into Long Term to look for it.”

Ennui gave an exasperated sigh. “Ooh La la. Fine. But we have to be on call for the emotions in the Unconscious too.”

Sadness gave a distressed moan at that. All she wanted to do was fall on her face and cry like the old days, but she couldn’t cry until they were safe. So, Sadness turned around and made her way over to the unsorted manuals. “Then we’ll have to split up if Anxiety doesn’t come back with it soon.” Ennui gave a little tut at that, but followed behind Sadness. Sadness rubbed her face as she reached for the next manual. “Oh, this is so sad! Riley needs us more than ever right now. I sure hope Joy and the others find her before she loses her memory like your manual on special emergencies warned.” Ennui just grunted at the comment, and the two darkly colored emotions each reached for a manual.

Joy felt her legs slightly burning while backtracking to Imagination Land. As she and Jr. approached the stream of consciousness, she started taking deep cleansing breaths. She still believed this would be the fastest way to the Unconscious, but she no longer felt entirely confident that she could do it.

Bing Bong Jr looked at Joy, seemingly oblivious to her distress. “So, ready to go diving, Joy?”

Joy looked back at Jr with a bit of apprehension. “Jr, am I crazy?”

The cotton candy elephant looked confused at that statement. “Crazy? Why would you think that? Sadness herself said there’s no such thing as an easy way to the unconscious, so this isn’t any less dangerous than what Fear, Anger and Harry are trying to do through the subconscious.”

Joy didn’t look any happier. “Jr, the only way I managed to save Riley the last time I was out of headquarters was with desperation and a stack of imaginary boyfriends jumping off a trampoline that an island of personality hadn’t lost yet. I’m very positive that it was a crazy idea that just so happened to work! But this? I’ve lived in headquarters for most of my life! I have no idea how good of a swimmer I actually am! And swimming all the way down? Sadness didn’t even specify how deep I’d need to go to do that!”

Jr though gave a friendly if not entirely innocent smile. “You’re Joy. Where’s that positive attitude you need to get us through anyway?”

Joy frowned. “That attitude was squeezed out of me over the last week. I did my best, but Riley didn’t always listen, and we kept making mistakes. And I just had my dreams shattered too!” Jr opened his mouth to ask a question. “Not the time! The point is, I want to save Riley badly enough to try, but we’ve been through too much for me to be confident in this working.”

The imaginary being though kept his smile up nonetheless. “Every good thing takes effort to get. Like when Riley had her second tryout for hockey, or when she and Bing Bong first learned to play in a band.” Joy blinked at Jr. knowing such small details. “The mind workers brought it up a few times while I was here. The point is that you lead Bing Bong and Sadness through so much already. I know that swimming down will be as easy as hugging mom and dad.”

Joy gave a sad shudder at that idea. She hated the thought that the family island wouldn’t be waiting for them when they returned. But, she quickly masked it, and turned to look at the stream. “Okay. Then let’s go.” She walked to the edge of the bank. She took some steps into the water until it was up to the hem of her dress, then looked Jr dead in the eyes. “In case we get separated, find Riley, then get to the belief system. No matter what happens to me, you have the radios, so you NEED to do that if you find Riley before I do. They’re pretty easy to operate, so you should be able to figure it out.”

Jr. joined her in the water. He didn’t respond right away. “Joy, we’ll get through this together.”

Joy though looked the new imaginary friend in the eyes. “I’m not kidding Jr. Riley’s been through too much this last week. You have to promise to find Riley before you find me. Get her back up to Sadness and the others before you even TRY to find me.”

Again, the elephant gave Joy an odd look, but then nodded. “Alright. But I WILL find you if we get separated. After all, Riley needs YOU more than she needs ME.”

As Jr. Reached out, they briefly held hands. Bing Bong Jr. gave Joy a big goofy smile, causing her to crack a half grin in response. Joy then slowly walked forward, leading the elephant behind her until the water was up to her chest. She turned to look at this accidental creation one more time, then swallowed. “See you on the other side, Jr.”

Then the two of them dropped their hands, took a deep breath and dove into the water.

As she began to swim down, Joy could feel a voice resonating through her body, and into her own head.

“What’s going on? Where am I? What am I holding? What do I do now? How come there’s a huge giant near me? Oh no! Run! Help! Someone please! I don’t know where I am! HELP!”

Joy could only assume she was still hearing Riley’s conscious thoughts even when she was in the Unconscious, but as she kept swimming down, those thoughts got quieter and quieter. But with no time to dwell on that fact, Joy dove deeper. She just kept going and going. She could hardly believe she could hold her breath for so long. But she kept diving. And diving. And soon, she could see a faint light far below herself. She wanted to check to make sure Bing Bong Jr. was behind her, but that would take more energy than she would’ve still had if she could just reach that light. So she stroked and stroked, as the light grew brighter and brighter, until finally…..

Joy burst through a pool of water. But the moment she broke the surface, she went flying out like she was a bottle rocket, giving a cry of “Whoa!” on the way out. She soared over some darkness, landing on what looked like a rock, until that rock suddenly broke off, and she was sent flying down on that rock. Down what looked like a black mountain. She faintly heard Jr’s cry of “JOY!” as she went sailing off away from where she’d broken through. She was skittering and sliding. Holding onto the rock for dear life, moving farther and farther from everything she ever knew was possible, into darkness, then into a swirl of colors. Just falling, and falling, until the rock hit a bump. Joy screamed in surprise as she went flying off, sliding through…whatever the surface was she was going through, and then finally passed out in shock from the fall.

And so, here she was. In the middle of the Unconscious. Lost. Alone. Without communication. Looking for their girl. Fighting her emotional guilt. Racing to rebuild headquarters. Trying to process what the other emotions had told her about family, guilt and courage. Dealing with some very strange sights, and trying to figure out how to convince Riley to not give up on the outside world. Joy gave a heavy sigh, then looked up again. The whole area seemed…drabber. Almost how Riley looked when she decided to run away. But…they were unconscious, so that felt…odd to think about.

Joy frowned to herself, then picked herself up. “Okay Joy. You’ll never find Riley if you stand still.” She briefly looked to the side and murmured, “I know..Mom..” She paused, then sighed. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up. I think I’ll have to let you go soon,” she whispered to herself like she was trying to keep a secret. Then Joy looked out at the vast ocean of colors and shapes in front of her. And taking a step forward, Joy called out as she began to make her way through the Unconscious. “Riley! Riley? Where are you? I just want to talk.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 7

Meanwhile, on the Outside…

Thursday Afternoon…

Jill Andersen was exhausted. Exhausted and emotionally distraught. After they’d heard Riley scream and saw her seemingly faint into their arms, she and Bill immediately called 911 and got their daughter taken to the hospital. It was a very stressful initial hour. Not helped by what the doctor told them after their initial examination in the emergency room.

“I’m not entirely sure what to make of this. She is unresponsive towards normal stimuli, but her breathing is strong enough that she doesn’t need a ventilator yet. We’re going to do a CAT scan to see if we can identify any cerebral hemorrhages, but having one at this age is pretty rare. Do you have any idea what might have caused this?”

Jill glanced at her husband before speaking. “Only a few days ago, Riley began to show schizophrenic symptoms. She admitted to hearing voices she couldn’t see. Had mood swings and seemingly began having unusual dreams about a place she might’ve wanted to be more than the real world. It really seemed to affect her school life, with calls about her supposedly cheating on a test, skipping class, and getting into arguments with her classmates. Then this happened tonight. All she could tell us before losing consciousness was that her head hurt.”

Doctor Cooley frowned. “That’s not exactly a clear connection. And outside my area of expertise in connecting psychological issues to this kind of physiological emergency.” Seeing the parents distressed looks, Dr. Cooley went on. “It’s possible that the stress of these new symptoms might have caused a reaction, but looking at her medical records, Riley had a good bill of health at her last check up. Nothing that would suggest something this severe. There must be something else. Is there anything at all that might’ve caused a reaction like this for Riley?”

Bill thought for a moment, but shrugged helplessly. “The only other idea I have is that something might have happened during Hockey practice. Apparently, she got into a pretty big collision during practice, but she seemed coherent and aware when we picked her up yesterday.”

Dr. Cooley still seemed perplexed, but his gaze became somber. “Hmm. Well, unfortunately, we can’t proceed until we have more information. However, if Riley shows any signs of an artery rupture, then we will have to operate on her immediately.” Seeing their frightened looks, the doctor looked them straight in their eyes. “It’s the only way to protect your daughter from any potentially lethal effects. Even if we don’t know the cause, if the symptoms are clear, we’ll have to move fast to save Riley’s life and her future.”

Both Bill and Jill reached for each other’s hands. They looked at each other, and neither of their expressions were calm. They both felt a fear even greater than when Riley went missing for a day.

Jill bit her lip. The most terrifying thing was the seemingly random connection between Riley’s schizophrenic symptoms and this shocking turn of events. It was the only thing that made any sense to her, but it still seemed so weird that anything like this might’ve led to Riley’s hospitalization. And the strangeness didn’t stop there.

After their CAT scans and a few additional tests, Dr. Cooley came back utterly confused. While Riley’s blood pressure was higher than normal, there’d been no signs of rupturing despite this fitting all the normal symptoms. There was some swelling in certain brain arteries, but none to a surgical level. The only thing they could do at first was partially relieve the brain pressure through a medical injection. Riley had seemingly stabilized, but was still in a Coma. And Doctor Cooley decided to keep Riley in the emergency ward on life support systems to monitor her condition. And to be prepared to do brain surgery if anything changed.

Seeing no better alternative, She and Bill agreed and returned home. Though as a precaution, they’d both signed off on conducting emergency surgery if the need arose. It’d been a messy rest of the night and day. They'd done a little exhausted arguing after getting back over whether they should’ve just gone for a surgery right away. Then neither of them had slept well. Bill had to go back into work, but said that he’d ask for time off for emotional distress. (Something Jill deeply appreciated) And Jill had mostly done busy work to try and keep her mind off of waiting for a call that may or may not come regarding her daughter from the hospital.

Jill then ran her hands over her face. This was much worse than what happened last year. Not only had Riley seemingly turned on them, but now her life was at risk. How could this have happened so fast after only a year in San Francisco? Maybe this move just wasn’t good for their family. Sure, it was all because of Bill’s new job, but if this was going to keep hurting Riley, maybe they should think about a new solution so their child wasn’t under so much stress in her life.

Suddenly, Jill heard the doorbell. She quickly looked over at the clock. It was about the time when Riley might come home. That only made her heart ache more, but she held her emotions together as she answered the door. But seeing who was on the other side only made her draw a breath. She knew this person being here meant a hard conversation she wasn’t ready for. She recognized them by their hair dye.

In Ann’s headquarters, Fear and Sadness were driving hand in hand together on the console. Though on occasion, Anger and Disgust had a button or two to contribute. They’d been going non stop for the last two days. Ever since Riley called them a traitor in the hall, it was as if all her worst fears came true at once. Fear and Sadness had been inconsolable for a good long while. Anger had given Tracy some choice words afterwards too, shocking everyone in HQ that a certain word was part of the curse word library.

Then after school, Ann had told Jordan that they couldn’t practice today. After everything, she just wanted to be alone. She’d gone into her room to try and distract herself by working on her next comic strip. But that had come to a head as well.

Ann was working on drawing a person. Just someone for the background of her next project. But she kept missing the mark. Not quite getting it to her liking. Her recycling bin now had wads of paper landing in it. Finally, she tried sketching full sized to make sure she could get the details down on the smaller size. But that was when she realized exactly what was happening. When she looked at what she’d drawn, it was plainly obvious that she’d drawn Riley.

“AAARRRGGGHHH!” Ann unleashed her frustration and grief all at once, pounding a fist on her desk. “Why? Why did you do this, Riley?? WHY DON’T YOU TRUST ME? WHY WON’T YOU LET ME HELP YOU??!!” She tore the paper in half, frustrated, and finally dropped her head in her arms. She could feel a great big ball of sadness, anger and fear welling up inside her, and she didn’t know how to stop it.

A knock came from her door. “Ann, may I come in?”

“Go away, Mom! I want to be alone!”

Despite Ann’s words, her door opened, and in came her mother. “Maybe so, but from the sound of things, you need someone to talk to.” She sat down on Ann’s bed. “What’s wrong Ann?”

“I said go..”

“Ann, something clearly happened to you at school. Did Tracy start bothering you again?”

Ann mumbled, “No.” Then after a pause. “Well, maybe a little.”

“Ann, I thought you were dealing with Tracy alright now that you reconnected with Jordan and made a new friend in Riley.”

Ann now raised up her face. There were tears in her eyes. “Mom, the problem IS Riley.”

Her mom scooted closer. “What happened?”

Ann didn’t say anything at first, trying to figure out how much she did or didn’t want to say. It felt like the final betrayal of Riley if she said something, but after all that happened the last few days, she just didn’t know what else to do. For herself or for Riley. Maybe she couldn’t do anything at all. But just that thought loosened Ann’s lips, and before she could stop, the words began to come out.

“These last few days, Riley’s been acting…different. It all started when she talked about personifying her emotions, but she got really defensive when Tracy said that she was crazy for thinking that. After our pizza planet trip, Riley seemed like she wasn’t as enthusiastic about life anymore. Then during psychology class yesterday, Mr. O’Brian was talking about Schizophrenia, and it really seemed to affect Riley. She…she’s afraid that she might have it Mom! But every time I tried to talk to her about it, she just pushed me away! She kept saying, ‘I’m not crazy!’ or ‘I don’t need help!’ A-And then when I was trying to stand up to Tracy for her today, she called me a traitor for agreeing that she needs help!”

Ann’s mother didn’t say anything during all this. Just letting Ann continue on.

“Mom, I just wanted to help my friend, and she called ME a traitor! I don’t know what to do!” The dam finally burst, and Ann flung herself at her mom, hugging her tightly. She wrapped her arms around Ann, gently holding her, letting her sobs run. Waiting for Ann to be a little more able to listen.

After a few minutes, Ann finally was coherent enough to sit up slightly, wiping her eyes. “And I don’t know what the point of saying this is. I’m not in Riley's family. I'm not even her friend anymore.”

“Of COURSE you’re her friend.”

Ann looked up at her mom incredulously. “Were you even listening to me?? Riley said..”

“I heard what Riley said. And Ann, you ARE Riley’s friend.” Seeing her face, her mom continued. “Look at how much you care about her! If you weren’t her friend, you might’ve turned your back on her after the way she treated you. But you didn’t. You still want to help her no matter what.”

Ann sniffed. “Because…true friends don’t abandon each other.”

Her mom smiled. “I remember Jordan said that once, right?” Ann nodded quietly. Her mom paused for a moment, trying to think of the best way to explain what it sounded like Riley was doing. “Ann, put yourself in Riley’s mind for a second.” The comment made Ann give an odd look, but she stayed quiet. “She lived what seemed like a perfectly fine life before moving here, then she had so much change at once. New state, new school. She took a few weeks to get comfortable, and now she begins to worry she might have a mental disorder? Anyone could get scared about losing what she’d just found for her life.”

Ann frowned. “She…did say she didn’t want to be seen as a freak.”

Mom cooed in sympathy. “Riley’s not like that at all. Even if she does have Schizophrenia, that just means she needs a little extra something to enjoy life as much as others. Not that she’s a freak or anything like that.”

Ann then looked at her mom, sadness and fear still in her eyes. “So, what do I do?”

Ann’s mom put her hands over Ann’s. “The only way Riley can really get help from you is if she accepts it. So the first thing I want you to do tomorrow is to go try and apologize to Riley. Tell her that you didn’t mean to upset her yesterday, and that you hope you both can still be friends. If you can start rebuilding a bridge to her that way, then just try to be as understanding and open to what she’s going through as you can.” Then Ann’s mother’s expression turned more serious. “If she pushes you away again, then it might be time to go to her parents or to Jordan’s mom to have someone with more power to step in and intervene.”

“But mom, Riley’s so scared of everything, she’ll never accept outside action!”

Her mom gave a sad, but firm shake of her head. “If there’s any chance Riley might hurt herself and won’t listen to you, then others need to step in.”

Ann looked down, conflicted. And her mom hugged her again.

“I know it’s a lot to ask of you, but that’s why you have to first try to just be her friend. Every day is a new day, and Riley might be ready to listen when you talk to her next.”

Ann hugged her mom tighter. She still felt scared and exhausted after all the worry Riley was putting her through. But, this did feel good. Having someone older to talk to about it. “Thanks mom.”

Her mom patted her a few more times, then stood up. “Remember, you can always tell us anything.” Then she pointed at her backpack. “Also, it’s getting late. You should finish your homework for tomorrow.”

“Moooom!”

Her mom chuckled. She walked back to the door, then paused. “Oh, and if you finish in the next hour, you can have an extra scoop of ice cream.”

Ann sighed, but gave a small smile. “Alright. Thanks again mom.”

The conversation had been tough for everyone in headquarters. Fear still didn’t buy that anything would change. But Joy and Sadness had at least given Ann a good cleansing memory of it all. Giving her a burst of optimism and hope. It didn’t create a new core, but it did create an extra bright memory that all the emotions did find nice.

Of course, that optimism the next day had been before the morning home room. That was when  Ann noticed that Riley’s desk was empty. When she brought it up, their teacher had announced that Riley was going to be absent from school today. Every emotion had been a mess through the rest of the day. Fear ranting about “mind collapses due to knowing about us”, Disgust giving Tracy upset glares in the hallway, Anger and Sadness both going off on rants about “blowing it with our best friend!” And poor Joy had barely gotten a moment in. Everyone had fretted over what might’ve caused Riley’s absence.

Finally, once school had gotten out, that was when Joy made a meaningful contribution. Bringing over an idea bulb that simply said Go Talk to Riley’s Parents. The other emotions were admittedly a little sheepish that they hadn’t thought of something so obvious. But Ann had immediately texted her parents that she was going to be late getting home. That she wanted to check on one of her friends who was sick today. Her mom has simply replied, “ Riley?” Ann didn’t answer that right away, but made her way towards Riley’s home.

So, they all now stood at the door of the Andersen house.

“You know,” Joy commented, trying to break the tension. “We actually don’t get invited over to Riley’s house. Maybe we should see if we can spend a weekend at her place once we get through all this.”

Disgust though had a skeptical look on her face. “Maybe there’s a good reason for that. It doesn’t exactly look like they have the most space. Where would we even hang out?”

Joy looked over a little hurt. “Well at least we could see her bedroom.”

Disgust then grunted. “Please. You know Ann isn’t the sleepover type. Too…childish.”

Anger growled slightly. “This is a mess. After yesterday, I’m still mad that she put us in the same category as Tracy as someone who thought she was crazy. That’s definitely not fair! And I’m even more mad at Tracy! She turned her back on us, and drove our friend to madness??”

Sadness looked over, giving Anger a small frown. “You saw how upset Riley was on Tuesday after she yelled at us. That’s not something you can fake.”

Anger sighed. Then glared at the door. “Something is going on beyond Riley getting defensive with us. Whether she knows about us or not, we’re not leaving until we figure it out.”

Fear meanwhile was nervously twirling a few levers as she was murmuring to herself. “I still don’t get why we’re digging into this. What if we find out something terrible? Like…Riley got hit by a bus. Or had a brain aneurysm!”

Disgust gave a small eye roll. “From what? What could possibly have stressed Riley’s mind so much that her brain reacted so badly?”

Fear didn’t respond right away. Just twiddling her thumbs briefly. “This is worse than when Tracy exposed us as uncool. At least Riley stepped in right away. The wondering is the worst part. Almost makes me wish we had another emotion that was much better at thinking about the future right now.” She took a glance at the Puberty Alarm in the middle of their console. “I don’t suppose we could get one sooner rather than later?”

Joy gave a light pat on Fear’s back. “Interesting idea, but Puberty is one of those things that we absolutely can’t control about Ann. You heard Jordan’s mom.”

Any further thoughts of the emotions were cut off as Mrs. Andersen answered the door. And as they looked at her, Disgust immediately gave a small gasp. The other emotions turned in expectation at why Disgust had reacted like that.

Disgust looked at the other emotions, and her expression wasn’t great. “She’s hiding something, and it’s not good.”

Sadness looked up, and also noticed the rings under her eyes. “Oh no.” She pressed a button. “She’s upset about something.”

The other emotions all looked at each other, and leaned forward.

Ann stuttered briefly. “H-Hi Mrs. Andersen.” Ann briefly looked down, unsure of how to ask, but then spoke up with a quiet insistence. “Is…Riley here?”

Jill swallowed. Putting on a brave face. “Ann! You know, I never told you how surprised I was when Riley decided to join a band, but I’m glad she’s trying new things.” However, Jill’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. And seeing Ann tilt her head slightly only made Jill more on edge. “I’m sorry, but Riley isn’t here right now. But I’ll be sure to tell her you came by.”

Jill moved to close the door, when something in Ann broke, and she realized she couldn’t live with herself if she didn’t know the truth. And thinking about Jill’s turn of phrase, she hotly asked, “Did you send Riley to a mental hospital??!”

Jill stopped her action, looking down in shock. “Ann, why would you say that?”

Ann felt something prickling under her skin. A kind of anger that she’d never really experienced all that much, but she had to express in some way. So with a bit of a hiss, she answered, “Because I know she’s been hearing voices!” Catching herself she then said with both fear and sadness, “She told me herself on Tuesday. Did…did it get worse?”

Jill really felt her emotions blowing up stronger than usual. There was a well of sadness that was now trying to get out of her, but she hadn’t lived her life without gaining some baseline emotional control. She looked down at this girl who just wanted the truth. Jill wasn’t entirely sure what to say, but in the end settled on a subdued, “Why don’t you come in for a moment Ann? There’s…there’s something you should know about Riley.”

Ann nervously followed her inside. Her fear was definitely on overdrive, but she had to know the truth. After all, she and Jordan had promised each other to be there for Riley even if the adults didn’t understand. And if Riley was in some kind of trouble, she’d be the first there by Riley’s side to show that she was still her friend.

Jordan was fiddling with his bass, when his phone went off. Catching his bass just as quickly as he dropped it, Jordan gingerly set it down before reaching for his phone. He supposed he and Ann weren't going to meet today. It was already getting pretty late. But he was surprised when he noticed the caller id was hers. So, he answered it. “Hello?”

There was a soft sound. It almost sounded like crying, but that didn’t make much sense. Jordan had NEVER even heard Ann cry. He’d seen her upset and paranoid, sure, but never cry. Jordan spoke again. “Ann, are you okay?”

Finally, Ann’s voice came in, and it sounded a little hoarse. “I’m not okay. Jordan…Riley’s in the hospital!”

In Jordan’s headquarters, Fear promptly pressed the panic button with both his hands. “NO! No, no, this can’t be real!

“GET OFF THAT!” Anger shouted. Trying to pry Fear off the console. “Don’t be an idiot, we have to respond!”

Sadness then quietly walked up to the side of fear, and pressed a button. The alarms were still going, but the console was now a mixture of purple and blue.

Jordan took a few moments to get his bearings. He was definitely feeling shocked, but also deeply sad. He took a small breath. “Are…are you sure?”

Ann now sounded very quiet. “I…I went over to The Andersen's house after school. Mrs. Andersen told me that she had…what she called a ‘thunderclap headache’, and then passed out in the middle of the night. She’s been unconscious and in the hospital ever since!”

Jordan now suddenly felt very small and scared. This wasn’t anything that he’d expect in his life. Especially not with his friends. He quietly asked, “And there’s nothing they can do about it?”

Ann’s voice now trebled. “She said they have to decide whether she needs Brain Surgery to get her out of her coma!” After a pause, Ann quietly asked, “Did…did we cause this somehow?”

Jordan quickly responded to that. “Ann, how could we cause this?”

“We should’ve done something! Maybe we could’ve gotten your mom to intercede yesterday! Or held an intervention? Just…something!”

Jordan really hated that he couldn’t see Ann right now. “Ann, I know you’re upset…”

“Oh I am much more than upset right now! Riley didn’t believe that we’d be there for her, and she shut us out! And now this happened after she started hearing voices?? I don’t know how, but I know it’s connected somehow!” Jordan held the phone slightly away from his ear as Ann went on, then it got quiet for a second. “I…I didn’t even get a chance to say I’m sorry about yesterday. I was going to try reaching out again, and she was already gone.” And after another pause, “It’s not fair.”

Jordan winced. This was way above what he’d expected. But, he tried his best to stay calm. “Ann, why don’t you try and listen to some music tonight?” with the awkward silence that followed, Jordan continued. “It’ll help relax you after this terrible news.”

Ann made a small noise, then answered, “Okay.” Then, after another pause, “I’m going back tomorrow if Riley isn’t better by then. If for no reason then to ask to visit her this weekend.”

Jordan mulled this over, then answered, “Then I’m coming with you. Riley’s my friend too, and we should be there to support her family.”

Ann sniffed on her end of the phone. “Thanks Jordan. See…see you tomorrow.”

The call ended, and Jordan gave a small sigh. Way above what he’d expected out of life for sure. He then made his way back downstairs. “Hey mom? Can you help me with something?”

Meanwhile, further away from Jordan, Ann and the Andersens….

Tracy slumped into her bed, exhausted. She should’ve felt relief. Riley wasn’t in class today. She was safe for now. There was no chance for that schizophrenic crazy girl to threaten her sanity or safety. Maybe she got taken away to an asylum after all. And yet…somewhere inside her, she felt an odd sensation. She wasn’t sure what it was, but it didn’t give her any satisfaction about today at all.

“Get away from there!”

“You can’t stop me! This has gone on too long!”

“Dogpile her!”

Tracy’s Sadness was fighting like a football player, dragging and pushing the other emotions. Trying her best to push some buttons on the console. She’d managed to push one or two, only to have that feeling mixed in with disgust or joy or fear. No matter how she tried, she couldn’t get a memory orb to herself for Tracy. Finally, the other emotions dragged Sadness to their thinking couch.

“What is WRONG with you??” Tracy’s Joy asked. “Riley’s gone. We’re safe. That crazy girl is out of our life! Why on EARTH do you want Tracy to be sad about that?”

“I don’t know!” Sadness’s scream echoed through headquarters. “I don’t know, okay? It just doesn’t seem right to be glad that anyone’s missing. No matter how dangerous she might be, Riley never actually hurt us. Not even when it looked like she was going to slap us yesterday.”

Fear spoke next. “But she could’ve! If she heard her emotions, then she’d pass that on to us before long, and then Tracy would crack! It’s much safer for all of us that we hope to NEVER see Riley Kaitlyn Andersen again!”

Anger then contributed. “And it’s the only justice we deserve! Getting even for what she did with Ann.”

Finally, Disgust stepped in front of Sadness. “Sadness, this was…a strange evening with your pressing, but maybe you should take a break. Turn in early for the night. We still have a stupid Math test to work on, so there’s no need for sadness there.”

Sadness felt something inside her break, and sobbed into her hands. “Why are you all so mean to me??”

Disgust gave an exasperated sigh. “Sadness, it’s all for Tracy. After what happened in 3rd grade, we made a promise to stay strong no matter what. To be the coolest, best girl in the world. And there just isn’t room for you in that equation. What kind of strong person needs to be sad about anything?”

Sadness looked up, but didn’t say anything. The expression was somewhere between horror and shattered. She then quietly got up without a word, and walked over to the ramp up to the bedrooms. For a moment, the other four emotions sighed in relief. Until, they heard a small clicking sound from near the ramp. And one phrase. “You are strong enough to be sad.”

Tracy squirmed uneasily. Something was nagging at the back of her mind. Something telling her that she could be strong even when she was sad. But that made no sense. Strength makes you strong. Not sadness. Not empathy.

She sighed. Maybe after sleeping it off, the strange unease she was feeling would go away. No, Riley Andersen wouldn’t plague her dreams or her desk. At least she hoped so.

Chapter Text

Chapter 8: Stewing in Thoughts

Anger, Fear and Harry arrived at the staircase to The Subconscious. Staring down, Fear was already twiddling his thumbs, staring at the enormous doors. This was hard enough last night, but now those doors looked like giant monsters waiting to swallow him up.

However, another, even bigger obstacle was already present. Namely, the mind police. They seemed to have cordoned off the entrance, with police tape and several officers around, standing about imposingly, or arguing about whose hat was whose again.

Anger scowled as he made his way down the stairs first. He wasn’t about to let a little bureaucracy or danger get in the way of rescuing Riley. Both Fear and Harry were behind him, but carrying themselves with far more hesitancy. As they reached the bottom, Anger made his way right up to one of the leading mind police. One with a fancy badge that designated him as “Captain Jonas”.

“Alright fancy pants,” Anger declared. “Let us in!”

Captain Jonas looked over at the emotion with a scowl. “And just what gives you authority to demand that of us, shorty?”

Anger could already feel his head smoking. “I don’t have time to argue with the likes of you! Useless…”

“Anger, don’t get carried away before we even get inside.”

“Shut up Fear! We don’t have time for this!”

Fear gently stepped around Anger. “Sorry, we’re kind of in a time crunch.” He looked Captain Jonas up and down. “Captain, as members of Headquarters, we need access to the Unconscious. And to do that, we have to go through the Subconscious.”

The mind officer looked at Fear with a scoff. “Oh I’m sorry. Do you really want to risk letting Jangles and Grandma’s vacuum run wild when we’re in a crisis? This space is secured for now, but we don’t want to take any chances.”

Fear pondered for a second, then decided to try something. “Not even for Protocol 1999?”

Captain Jonas suddenly took a step back. “What’s that you say? We’re supposed to follow Protocol 1999?”

Fear nodded. “It’s the main path forward for a mind affected by consciousness tampering. So if the mind police need to do anything special…”

The Captain pulled out a whistle, and blew it. “Lads! Half of you get to Language Processing. The other half, help me get these doors open. It’s protocol 1999!”

The officers quickly began scrambling about. Some went back to the stairs, others began running for the doors.

Harry came up alongside the two emotions, slightly confused. “So..what does protocol 1999 mean to you captain?”

Captain Jonas gave a rueful grin. “Protocol 1999 is a special emergency for the force. We need to protect Riley from losing her ability to speak, but it also gives all emotions absolute authority until Headquarters is rebuilt.” He looked back at the door to the subconscious as officers began pulling at the rings. “No officer has ever made the full journey from the subconscious to the unconscious, but if you say you have to go there, then you’ll need this.” He reached under his hat and handed them a key. “At the deepest point of the subconscious, there’s the gate which helps keep the two separated. You’ll need to use this to unlock it. But DON’T LEAVE IT OPEN! Even if you have to double back, be sure and lock up when you’re done.”

Fear grabbed the key, and placed it into his emergency pack. “Understood. Thank you Captain Jonas.” The three travelers then made their way to the door, slipped inside, and the gates closed behind them with a thud.

Fear looked backwards briefly. “So, do we want to try coming back out this way once we find Riley? It might get messy down there, but we can definitely go back the way we came if we want.” He reached into his pack, pulling out a rope. “I don’t know how far we’ll have to go, but we can at least follow this backwards if we want.”

Anger gave Fear an annoyed glance. “We might need that rope as we go down. We’ll just have to wing it until we actually find our girl.”

Harry stared ahead into the darkness. “So, you all were here yesterday, right?” The emotions nodded. “Did anything…interesting happen while you were here?”

Anger and Fear gave each other a brief glance before Fear spoke. “Riley wasn’t exactly in a good place when we visited here last. I think she wanted to come to try and get rid of her fears. She tried conscious tampering in this space, but almost caused a cave in when she tried it on Grandma’s Vacuum Cleaner. Although, I do think Jangles did get caught up in the mess.”

Harry nodded, seemingly noncommittal. “Alright. So, which way do we go to the Unconscious?”

Anger paused for a moment, looking at the things in the entrance hall. He scowled at the Broccoli to his right. “You still ruined our first lunch in San Francisco, Broccoli! I’d burn you down myself if we weren’t in a rush.” Then he turned to his left, and looked at, “The stairs to the basement in our old house!” Then he looked at his two companions who were both nervously holding each other. “Well, if we need to go down, then let’s start by taking the stairs.”

Fear swallowed deep. “Okay. Why…why don’t you lead the way Anger? I may want this, but I am NOT confident that I won’t run back screaming if I go first.”

Anger sighed. “Keep up you scaredy cats.” He began making his way down the stairs, with Fear and Harry right behind him.

They were making their way into pitch black, but Anger had a scowl of determination on his face. And so, his head was lightly glowing as they descended downwards, giving them all some light. Fear also reached into his bag, pulling out a flashlight that also lit the way down.

Harry looked over to Fear. “If the unconscious is locked behind a gate, does that mean Riley naturally created a boundary between those two parts of her mind? Or did something actually manage to create a gate to protect Riley?”

Fear shrugged, his hands shaking as they kept going down. “Probably the first thing. The Captain did say that nobody had managed to go all the way to the unconscious before.”

“And…you’re not worried that when we reach there, something terrible might be waiting behind it?”

“Of course I’m worried!” Fear exclaimed. “We are literally in my least favorite place of Riley’s mind right now. If we weren’t in a coma I wouldn’t come within 80 yards of this place. But we have to save her, and if that means going down, then we’re going down!”

Anger then paused for a moment, seemingly at the end of the staircase. However, in front of them was now a mountain pass which seemed unnaturally thin. It led to a bridge that had a gap over  what looked like a chasm. Anger turned to look at Fear, frustration in his eyes. “So, you really didn’t like when we drove through the mountains, huh?”

“That mountain pass in Idaho was WAY too narrow and high!” Fear immediately said.

Anger then pointed to the path ahead. “Oh, and I suppose you’re going to jump us over this bridge now? We were making perfectly good progress, and now we’re stuck!”

The two emotions got face to face. Fear now crossed his arms. “Well, we could tie the rope into a noose to then get across.”

“What do we have for it to grab onto?”

“I’m pretty sure I might have a poll if you want to try jumping the bridge.”

“I’m not putting myself at the mercy of YOUR gear you wiggly wimp.”

Fear opened his mouth, but was interrupted…by Harry. “Let me try.”

Anger and Fear both looked over at the figment, both with a raised eyebrow. Harry met their glances. “I’m just as tall as Fear, and I think I can make the jump. Give me the rope, and I’ll bring it across.”

Fear nervously looked at Anger, who shrugged, and gestured to ‘well, hand it over.’ Fear reached back into his bag, and pulled out the rope. Handing it to Harry, he tied a noose on both ends, and then took a few steps back. He then broke into a run, and leapt at the hole. Soaring over the gap and…landing securely on the other side. Harry took a deep gasp immediately after. “I’m…brave? I…I’m brave. I would die for Riley.” He then put one of the nooses over a raised piece of concrete, and threw the other half to the emotions.

Anger caught it with an impressed smile. “Well, good work Harry.” He then tied the rope to a splinter of wood, and began climbing across the rope, clinging to it with his whole blocky body. “Maybe this won’t be as hard as I thought.”

Fear groaned as he grabbed onto the rope next. “Please don’t say that Anger. That’s like whenever Joy says ‘what could happen?’ You know that we haven’t even reached more substantial things that I worry about.” Fear kept inchworming across the rope, shaking, but moving quickly. “It’s only going to get harder the farther we go.”

Anger grabbed Fear as he reached the other side. Giving Fear a raised eyebrow. “Do you have any..ideas of what might be further down?”

Fear nervously shook his head. “Even if I did, there’s too much to think about.”

Anger frowned. “Let’s keep going,” he commanded. He took the lead again, as the three continued on in darkness and fear, continuing their search for the Unconscious.

Disgust gingerly placed a foot on the tarp Paula had set up. Wincing slightly as the sole of her shoe dug into it. Envy was right next to her, looking uneasily at the long distance they had to go.

Envy quietly and shakily said, “You know, maybe Sadness was right the first time. This does seem really unsafe.”

Disgust frowned. “You promised to come with me, Envy. Don’t tell me you’re getting cold feet before we even start.”

Envy shuffled her tiny feet briefly, looking down. Then she tapped a shoe on the cover too. With a bit of treble in her voice she replied, “I…I’m more worried that by the time we reach the middle, it’ll slump down and we won’t be able to climb back up from there.”

Disgust thought about that, but then looked at the mind workers still strengthening other covers going over the dump. “Well, the alternative is taking the long way around through the unseen long term sections. This is going to be faster.” Then she looked down at her shoes. “And at least Riley created me wearing flats instead of heels. Then we can stay on top without worrying about creating punctures as I walk.” She took one step onto the cloth, putting her weight on it. It sagged slightly, but the poles holding it on the near side seemingly held firm. “Come on. We got a kid to save. And we’ll take it every step of the way together.”

Envy looked at Disgust still with some nerves. “Really?”

Disgust swallowed, but put on a smile. “Really.”

Envy hopped next to her, causing a deeper indent, but no other damage seemingly. “Well then, let’s go.”

The two emotions began making their way straight across. It was seemingly slow going, but at least they could tell they were making progress as Dream Productions got farther and farther away the longer they walked. There was a silence between them at first, but then Envy, seemingly wanting to calm her nerves, spoke up.

“Hey, so, what do you think Riley SHOULD do once we wake her up?”

Disgust looked down as they kept going. Not answering at first. Then, turning it around on Envy, Disgust replied, “Why do you ask?”

“It’s just, my job is to make sure Riley knows who she should be like and what other cool things she should have. Great hockey athletes like Katie King or Hilary Knight. Or maybe getting that killer game system we saw in the store window a few weeks ago. However, when it comes to this? We don’t exactly have an example. For all we know, we’re going to be one of one for all our life. So, what do you think Riley should do after she wakes up?”

Disgust thought for a bit. Remembering everything they’d been through and done all this time. Trying to think of a good answer, Disgust looked over at Envy, who had a concerned look on her face.

Envy then uneasily asked, “You…don’t know. Do you?”

Disgust scoffed. “I have my opinions, thank you very much. But, so will all the other emotions too. I’m sure this is going to give Fear all the excuse he needs to try and find a way to fix the intercom so this can’t happen again. Or Sadness might want us to more seriously talk with Mom and Dad about when might be a good time to take antipsychotics. See if that helps.”

“I’m not asking what they would think. I’m asking what YOU think, Disgust. And I don’t like that you’re not answering me.”

Disgust frowned. Envy was more perceptive than she thought. “Alright, alright,” she conceded. “The truth is, I don’t think there’s necessarily anything Riley SHOULD do once she wakes up.”

Envy looked at Disgust very confused. “So…you want her to keep going like nothing’s changed?”

“No. I’m saying that I don’t think there’s anything Riley HAS to do once she gets out of this.”

“But she has to do something once we wake her up! We can’t just stand around and let everyone else decide what’s best for us.”

Disgust raised an eyebrow over that statement, reminded of another short emotion who made a similar declaration last year. “Riley’s still only 12. I don’t see why we don’t just listen to our parents and have them take care of it.”

Envy then gave a deadpan look very similar to what Disgust would sometimes shoot Joy or Anger when they said something rather silly. “Unless you want to tell them about us, I don’t see how what they want is what Riley needs.”

Disgust looked away at that. “But how can we say we know what she needs either?” She then looked back at Envy, whose eyes widened a little seeing the upset look on Disgust’s face. “We tried pretending like nothing changed, and all we got was a distracted and frustrated Riley. We tried drip feeding information, and that’s when Tracy started calling Riley crazy. We tried telling the truth, and Riley locked us out. Then we tried to give emotional advice, and Riley thought that she was going to be forever alone on the outside! She said she hated her life!” Disgust had slowly raised her voice, getting more and more passionate the longer she talked. “And then after another bad day of tests and arguments and maybe intercom breakdowns, she decided that she’d just…override us to try and lock herself inside!?” Disgust finally stopped walking, looking down at Envy with a mixture of distaste and grief. “Don’t you get it Envy?? Riley needed us more than anything to guide her through all this. To protect her from all the poisonous social minefields she was walking and I let her down ! Why should what I think matter after how much we messed up?!?”

Envy now looked genuinely scared. Actually falling down, staring up at Disgust in shock. “Disgust, I…I didn’t…”

Disgust growled. “Forget it. I don’t want to talk about it. It doesn’t matter right now anyways.” Disgust then moved away, a little faster than before. “Once we get an actual console, and bring Riley to it, we can start over and let some other emotion figure out what to do.”

Envy stayed there for a few seconds longer, watching Disgust move away. She hauled herself to her feet, and started after her. But as she rushed to keep up, she mumbled to herself, “We’re cousins in action Disgust. We’re supposed to be the smart, social ones. We should have an opinion, because otherwise we’ll just blow up more of those mines when she wakes up again.” Disgust didn’t seem to hear her, but Envy now realized that she had to find some example to draw on, or Disgust wouldn’t be ready once they restored Headquarters.

Sadness stared at the last manual in her hand: Outside Assessment. While this would certainly be useful once Riley began recovery, this wouldn’t help them with getting the console ready. She gave a heavy sigh, looking over to Ennui. “It’s not here.”

Ennui sighed right back. “Bien sûr que non.” (Of course it’s not)

Sadness looked with unease out towards the long term shelves. “I have no idea how fast Anxiety can run, and even if I did, we have no idea how far a manual could end up from headquarters. We’ll be looking for a needle in a haystack! It’s impossible!” Sadness finally let out a burst of emotion, collapsing on her face.

Ennui looked down at the grieving emotion before letting out an exasperated groan. “Pick yourself up La Tristesse.” She roughly gave Sadness a boost, setting her back down on her feet, though Sadness still seemed like on the verge of tipping back over. “Maybe all we need for right now is a little patience.”

Sadness gave Ennui a confused stare, and sniffed. “We have no idea what surgery will do to us or to Riley. We have to get her going before it’s too late!”

Ennui snorted. “Well, perhaps it’s best to just lie here and find out. If it works, then maybe we won’t have to try so hard from our side. Maybe Riley does need brain surgery to be a normal girl again.”

Sadness frowned at that, but tried to take Ennui’s words seriously. Thinking about their situation, she looked back at the manual on Special Emergencies. “Whatever we’re in now, we don’t even know an outside surgery will work. Do you want to risk everything on Riley getting close to death before she gets a surgery that might not even work?”

Ennui frowned a little deeper. “Turning my ideas back on me? Ooh La La.” She looked at the manuals again. Then back to the tarps now beginning to cover the memory dump, even as rocks continued to fall, and memory orbs were flying out of pipes into the dump all the while. “Well, it’s too bad we can’t track where manuals would land if they flew out of Headquarters.”

Sadness slowly turned her head at that. “Say that again?”

Ennui frowned. “No.”

Sadness frowned looking down. “Just…once more? I won’t ask you to do anything else, Ennui.”

“It’s…too bad we can’t track where manuals would land?”

Sadness blinked. Then hurried to the alphabetized manuals. She ran her hand over the various titles, before picking out Manual 1: Your Mind: An Overview . She opened it up to a section that came out like a pop up book. On the pages was a map of Riley’s mind.

Ennui looked very confused. “Wait…if this manual has a map of The Mind World, then what did you give Anxiety?”

“That manual was Long Term Memory Organization. This is an overview of the mind on a healthy day. And…” She pointed a finger at the Headquarters in the middle of the map. “Emergency Evacuation is set up to send things towards the back of the mind, so we don’t have to worry about everything on the other half of the map.” Then she pointed a finger to the space between Imagination Land and Dream Productions. “We landed here, but we were on the Train of Thought. Being so big, the train didn’t go as far as other things could. Disgust finding Envy in Dream Productions means that something smaller probably went farther. But since Envy only made it to Dream Productions, it’s unlikely any manual went all the way to the expansion territories.” At that, Sadness pointed towards an area without many special areas closer to the back of the mind. She then swept her hand over the picture of long term memory, and pointed to two specific areas bracketing the middle of the mind. “Anxiety is covering most of Long Term memory, so the two places we could meaningfully search are here, and here.”

Ennui looked at the spots. “Abstract Thought and The Vault?” Sadness nodded. Ennui looked at the two spaces, then sighed. “Well, not that I care, but I’d look at The Vault first. If the Mind Police found a manual and thought it was dangerous to leave lying around, they’d throw it in the vault first thing. You could follow the train of thought tracks straight there if they haven’t broken during all this.” Sadness gave a small smile at the suggestion. Ennui rolled her eyes. “I’m not going. I don’t want to argue with the guards to get into the other guarded area of Riley’s mind.”

Sadness again frowned, but nodded. “Someone needs to be here if the others need information from the manuals.”

Ennui gave a belligerent groan being reminded of that. Then she scooted over to grab one of the imaginary chairs, and plopped down in front of the organized manuals, grabbing the radio Envy had left behind. “Well, you better get going. You and Anxiety are the ones who put the most work in reading these. I won’t be able to find things as fast as you.” Ennui then pulled out her phone, and turned her attention towards it.

Sadness didn’t directly respond to that. Instead, she glanced at the position of the Vault, and gave Ennui a small, “Thank you.” Then picking up the other remaining radio, Sadness made her way out into the mind. Off on her own mission to find the last missing manual.

Joy’s head was still sensitive, but not from pain. Frankly, she found the Unconscious a very confusing area to navigate. It was weird enough when all she saw was flying memory orb pieces, but right now she seemed to be running in a spiral. And not up or down but sideways as if she was a propeller running along a black rail that had no floor.

The worst part though wasn’t the visuals, it was the sound. The Unconscious had very strange sounds all around her. Some music, some crickets. Sometimes as she ran, the only sound she could hear was her own feet.

Joy REALLY hoped that Bing Bong Jr. was able to navigate this world easier than her. In a place like this, it would be TOO easy to get lost. But she couldn’t stop now. Not until she found Riley and got her out of here. There was no turning back anyways.

As Joy kept running, she came out of the swirl and found herself in a field of what looked like food. A LOT of food. Pizza, hamburgers, Bundt Cake, Cheese Curds, Crab, and surprisingly enough, Broccoli. Joy hesitantly walked up to this cluster, walking among the tall towers of pizza and seafood. “Well, at least I’m not going in nonsense directions anymore. The only trouble is, I have no idea where I am.”

“Ah! Company! Welcome To My Home!”

Joy turned, and took a small step back seeing an enormous looking man step in front of her. He wasn’t enormous for being tall, although he was clearly at least 20 feet taller than her. But rather, he was very wide, with a stomach that bulged out. He was Purple, Indigo, Yellow and Green, and while he had a smile on his face, Joy didn’t like the way he was staring at her.

“Uh…hi. I’m Joy. I’m from upstairs.” Joy paused for a moment, seeing his eyes sparkle with recognition. “Can I ask who you are?”

The being grinned. “Oh my word! Joy??!!! You’re just who I’ve wanted to meet one day. I’m Hunger!”

“Hunger?”

“I’m not exactly an emotion, but you all can’t do a thing without me to keep us going.” Hunger grinned toothily at Joy. “It’ll hit the spot to…EAT YOU! THEN I WILL BE THE NEW THING IN CONTROL OF RILEY!” His voice turned deep as his eyes turned red, and he reached down to grab Joy. Yelping in surprise, Joy took off.

“Why, why, Why didn’t I just hold onto the bag???” Joy cursed at herself as she wove through the different foods. She hid herself behind a piece of bread, only for it to be lifted up by Hunger, who tried reaching for her again. Joy jumped through his fingers, then ran up his arm. She didn’t exactly know what she was doing, but she had to deal with Hunger if she was going to escape to find Riley.

Hunger kept trying to grab Joy, only for her to pause right in front of his face. An idea sprouting in her mind. “Right here big guy,” she waved. Hunger reached for her again, but this time Joy jumped straight down. Hunger smacked himself in the face, and Joy landed on his belly, barely feeling the drop. As Hunger toppled over, Joy jumped off, and began running for a stalk of broccoli nearby.

“Wait! Stop! I’m sorry.”

Joy stopped for half a second, and turned to see Hunger on his hands, tears in his eyes. “I really am sorry. It’s just…so many of the others down here think of me as a joke!”

Joy very cautiously stopped moving. “And why did you think eating me would change that??”

Hunger slumped down. “That's all I know. Somehow, I think food will make everything better. And I thought, if I get my hands on Joy, then maybe I’ll finally be taken seriously.”

Joy frowned at this logic. “Well, if I’m not working, how can you even know if it’s working? Riley needs me to be happy.”

Hunger sighed. “I suppose you’re right. Riley isn’t too reliant on food in itself. She’s so…patient with it. Treats it as nourishment but not comfort. It’s so weird to me.”

Joy slowly began to smile. “Hey, that’s not true. There’s nothing like a good slice of pizza to make a day more bearable.”

Hunger gave a half smile at that. “I suppose that’s why the pizza towers are my favorite.” He glanced at the towers of Pepperoni, Meat Lovers and Cheese Pizza that loomed over them. “But, what ARE you doing down here? Emotions shouldn’t be anywhere in The Unconscious. It’s really easy to get lost!”

Joy sadly began walking back towards Hunger. “I had to come down here. Riley’s in Trouble!” Seeing Hunger’s shocked expression, Joy went on. “She accidentally overloaded the console, and Headquarters collapsed into the dump! According to the manuals, this is the most likely place she’d be, but everything is so confusing here I can’t find any sign of her!”

Hunger now looked horrified. “Oh no! If Riley’s stuck down here, then she’ll never be able to eat real food again! And I’ll never get to expand my palate!” He slowly tried to pick himself up. Not an easy task with how wide he was, but eventually, he hauled himself up. “You…you have to find her! Wait…” Hunger then became pensive, and then frowned. “Is this why Gloom has been so active of late? Some of us down here in the Unconscious were starting to get annoyed how many times Gloom began overtaking our areas. That stuff is like a blight down here!”

Joy frowned. “Maybe? It did get up into the console a few times…” She shook her head. “We’re hoping to find a way to better manage it in the future. But, has anything strange happened down here recently? Anything that might’ve been caused by Riley?”

Hunger pondered for a moment, then snapped his fingers. “There was something a little strange, although it was pretty far away. I noticed a bright light fall towards one of the nexuses of the Unconscious only a few hours ago. It seemed so small compared with some of us, but it shone like an orange in the sun!”

Joy perked up. “Where? Which way is it?”

Hunger pointed towards a green swirl to his left. “Follow that corridor until you reach Egopolis. Then turn towards the forest of hidden influences. I think the light might’ve fallen somewhere in that area.”

“Can you lead me there?”

Hunger frowned, then shook his head. “I get too hungry without indulging in my food. I wouldn’t be able to help myself if I came with you. I’d try to eat you.”

Joy sighed in disappointment, but put on a smile. “Well, thank you for the directions, Hunger. I’ll be sure to send down some extra pizza when we fix all this.”

Hunger’s eyes started to turn again, but he closed them, and turned to look at a chicken drumstick. Without looking at her, he solemnly said, “Goodbye Joy. I hope you never have to come down here again.” He lunged at the chicken, and a terrible eating sound was heard.

Joy ran for the green swirl with a nervous energy. As she reached it, the swirl opened up into a surreal tunnel that blinked. Joy just kept running. Watching little meteors of memories fly past her, and once again finding herself running in a spiral. Not again! She mentally complained. But she just kept going, until at last, the tunnel opened up to a shining city. It almost looked like it was made of glass, but it shone with a yellow light as if it was being lit from the center.

Joy came to a pause. She seemed to be on a black hill overlooking the city. And that’s when she saw the sign. “Egopolis: It’s the City all about Me.” Joy blinked at that last part. “Who’s me though?” she ruminated. Then she remembered what Hunger had shared, and looked for anything that seemed like a forest. After scanning over the area, she finally noticed what looked like a forest on the right side of the city closest to her. Joy chanted to herself, “Hang in there Riley. I’ll find you soon enough.” Then she started making her way down the hill, eager to reach Riley no matter the cost.

Bing Bong Jr. uneasily paused in his running. He wanted to find Joy, and had sped off down the mountain trying to reach her, but lost track of her after her rock sped off over the horizon in a swirl of colors. Jr. wanted nothing more than to run after her, but remembered Joy’s last words.

“You have to promise to find Riley before you find me. Get her back up to Sadness and the others before you even TRY to find me.”

Reluctantly, Jr instead pivoted himself to walk off in a different direction. But before going farther, he reached into the bag, and pulled out the radio. Pressing the button on the side, he shouted out, “This is Bing Bong Jr. Can anyone read me? Hello? Hello?”

After a brief crackle, a voice came out. “ This is Sadness. I can’t help you right now Bing Bong Jr. I’m away from the manuals. Turn your radio to channel 5. I think Ennui is on there.” Then with a little more cheer, Sadness added, “ At least we know these can work in the Unconscious. So turn your knob to the left until you can talk with Ennui. She has the best chance of giving you help. Oh, and tell Joy that I’m glad you all made it through.”

“Sure Sadness….it’s good to hear from you. I’ll be sure and tell Joy that,” Jr said. He frowned, realizing the unintentional lie he’d just said, but shook his head. “I will find you,” he murmured. Then following her instructions, he turned the radio channel, and spoke again. “Ennui? Are you there?”

After about eight seconds of waiting, “ Ugh. Who is this? ”

“This is Bing Bong Jr. Do you have any way for us to get around the Unconscious? Any way to determine where to go?”

“ UUUgh. Stand by. I’ll see what I can find.”

Jr. sat down where he was, watching memories fly by. He even managed to catch one which had an image of Riley riding Bing Bong’s wagon. He smiled at that, but then sighed. “ Those aren’t really me. I still love Riley, but I’m practically a stranger to her. Maybe we should go on a play date after we get back. Establish real memories in her mind that are of me rather than my father.”

Finally, after a few minutes a crackle came over the radio. “ So, we don’t exactly have maps. But I can tell you that the Unconscious usually will have anchor points for some of Riley’s more significant troublemakers. The belief system is supposed to be directly below Headquarters, so if you want to get there, try and figure out which way would be back towards the memory dump from where you came out.”

“Okayyyy…”

“ Joy got separated from you already, didn’t she?”

“What? No! What makes you think…”

“ Please Bing Bong Jr, you wouldn’t be using these if Joy was there to operate it instead.”

Jr. sighed. “Okay, that’s right. But as soon as I find Riley, I’m going to find her!”

“ Whatever. Just, don’t get caught. There are things down there that would do anything to get out and use you as the means.”

“Alright. Thank you Ennui.”

“ Keep going Imaginary Elephant.”

Jr looked back at the mountain they came from. Reaching into his memories, he recalled how they swam down, but came out facing away from the memory dump. “So, I need to turn around, go around the mountain to start getting to the belief system.” And Jr. did just that.

Strolling through the black and blue space, he sang to himself. “Who’s your friend who likes to play? Bing Bong, Bing Bong. His music makes you shout hooray! Bing Bong, Bing Bong.” It wasn’t much, but it was enough to keep his nerves together as he walked along. He kept on going for what seemed like 20 or so minutes, before coming on what looked like a black void, with a single spotlight that shined in the middle. Jr gave a blink, but shrugged. “Well, the only way out is forward.” He stepped into the light, making his way across. However, as he reached the edge of the light beam, he seemed to bump into something. “What?”

“Who…who are you?”

Jr. turned around, to see what looked like a grey being. With long hair, and darting eyes. They were wearing something grey and overcast, and although they looked pretty small from where he was standing, as it got closer, it felt like it was getting bigger.

“Oh, uh, hi! I’m Bing Bong Jr. Who are you?”

The being kept getting closer, and bigger. It was now about 18 feet away, but it already looked 10 feet tall. In a slightly raspy voice, it said, “I…I’m….Loneliness.”

Jr. looked up at Loneliness, still smiling, but feeling a light unease. “Loneliness?”

“I was born…last year. After Riley sat alone during lunch. Because…Sadness does a lot of my job…I was sent down here after I appeared…in Abstract Thought.”

Jr looked down at Loneliness’s feet, and noticed that there was a blackness spreading out from her. “Hey, what’s that near your feet?”

Loneliness looked down. Then shrugged. “It happens sometimes. This darkness…is like my old friend. The one thing that I’ll…always have to be with. Like so much of my life. Always alone. Never with anything…to give me comfort. Never giving comfort…except in a full embrace.”

Jr frowned sympathetically. “I can understand that…somewhat. It’s not easy being by yourself. But that’s why it’s so important to have people you can enjoy being with.”

Loneliness now was within 6 feet of Jr, and towered over him like Jangles would’ve. “So many others come here…but they never stay. Riley needed me so much lately…but Spite and Narcissism said that I can never truly come out…because of the emotions.” Loneliness then came down towards Bing Bong’s level, but its eyes were as big as the elephant. “Why? Why does Riley feel so alone? Why…did she call on me so much this week? I thought after…she hugged her parents….that I could rest…but I can’t! What is going on up there???”

Jr very quietly got close to Loneliness’s ear, and whispered into it. Loneliness jerked back. Glowing yellow eyes shining in shock. “No. No! I couldn’t…I couldn’t have…why would she…did I make her…”

Loneliness looked down at its hands, then looked at Jr, who then took an uneasy step backwards.

“I…I can help? We’re going to find her and make sure you can rest.”

Loneliness then looked at Jr, and reaching down, grabbed him, hauling Jr up to its face, bag and all. “Not yet. The others will need to see you first.” The light above them seemingly clicked off, and Jr gave a distressed wail at the sudden darkness. However, Loneliness reached its other hand up and gently stroked Jr’s head. “Don’t worry. Even down here…nobody wants Riley to die. But I need direction. And…maybe you need it too. Maybe…maybe this is how Riley was always meant to be.”

And Loneliness began to slink away. Jr was now very aware that he might be in a lot of trouble. “Oh,” he whimpered to himself. “Where are you Joy? Where are you Riley?” Loneliness turned its head to hear those words, but didn’t say anything at first. Just slinking into the swirling blue masses that lead deeper into the Unconscious.

Chapter Text

Chapter 9: Mental Strength

Sadness approached The Vault. As she looked up, she shuddered slightly. The Vault was where Riley kept all her deepest secrets, and given their emergency state, Sadness wasn’t sure if the mind workers would open up for her. Nonetheless, she began walking up the steps. No matter her apprehension, Ennui was right. If any mind worker picked up a manual, this would be an easy place to store it for safekeeping.

Getting to the top step, Sadness took a moment to wipe her head. A part of her wondered how she managed to sweat since she was an emotion. But then again, she did cry a lot, so she must have some kind of fluid inside her even if she was an energy being. Then Sadness made her way towards the front doors. However, as she got closer, Sadness noticed someone already there who was pounding on the gates.

*Boom, Boom, Boom*

But it seemed nothing was getting in. Heck, Sadness couldn’t even tell if there was someone on the other side to respond. Sadness cautiously made her way forward. “Um, excuse me?”

The being jumped back in surprise. Looking up, Sadness noticed that it was a guy, but he was bright pink, with scruffy looking hair, a big nose, and wearing a very snug grey hoodie. He shrunk back. A surprising action considering he was at least three times taller than Sadness.

Sadness very slowly began approaching him. “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you.” The being shrunk back even more, but found himself against a pillar. “It’s alright. What’s your name, big fella?”

The pink man just looked down, seemingly ashamed or uneasy with being near Sadness.

Sadness smiled hesitantly. “Well, you don’t have to say it right away. But whenever you’re ready, I’m here.” The being looked at Sadness, still shifty eyed, but finally pulling a paper out of his pockets and handing it to her. Sadness quickly looked at it. “My name is…Embarrassment?” She looked up at Embarrassment, who just looked down, seemingly bashful. Sadness handed back the paper. “Well, nice to meet you. Are you one of the other emotions from downstairs?” Embarrassment nodded quickly. “What are you doing at the Vault?”

Embarrassment slowly mimed something with his hands. Sadness watched. “You overheard us talking earlier.” Nodding, Embarrassment then pointed to the door. “ And wanted to look in the Vault for something to help?” Another nod. “But nobody’s answering?” Embarrassment looked despondent, sitting down with a thump. Sadness walked up to hold his hand, but he jerked back before she could reach him. “It’s alright. I know another way.” Embarrassment looked at Sadness with surprise, but shrugged in confusion. Sadness gave a little smile. “I read a manual on this. The Vault has front gates for big things being kept a secret, but also a back door for memory orbs that might need to be held. We can go check over there for any mind workers.” Sadness began walking off, so Embarrassment quietly followed behind her as they walked to the backside of the Vault.

The backside was just as grey as the front, but there was a little service entrance for mind workers in the middle. Sadness walked up to the door, and knocked. No answer. She knocked again. Still nothing. Sadness now frowned. “What’s going on in there? We need to see if they have a missing mind manual!” She looked back at Embarrassment. “I had to come here to look! I can’t leave without checking.”

Embarrassment looked sad hearing Sadness, so he looked up at the building but then pointed with emphasis. Sadness followed his finger, and saw what looked like a window. She looked back at him. “I can’t climb that far.”

Embarrassment knelt down, and offered out his hand. Sadness looked him in the eyes. “You want to try?” He nodded. So, Sadness stepped onto his hand. Gently, he walked up to the side of the building. First they tried stretching up to the window, but they were still a few feet short. Embarrassment looked at Sadness in his hands, and gave her a serious glance. Seeing what he was thinking, Sadness just asked, “You sure?” Embarrassment nodded. He took a few steps back, leaning back his hand, and then, Sadness was tossed straight up into the window, breaking through it, and landing on the other side. Slowly picking herself up, Sadness called up to the window. “Thank you, Embarrassment! Get to Dream Productions to wait with Ennui. I don’t know how to get to the back door from here.” She didn’t hear any reply, so Sadness dusted off her sweater, and looked around.

With a hanging label that said ‘Friend secrets’, there were several locked vault doors, but a couple open ones as well. Frowning, Sadness called out, “Is anyone here? Hello? I need help finding something!” It echoed through the area, but nobody answered. Sadness felt an overwhelming grief. Some hot tears formed under her eyes, and she slumped down along the side of a wall. “I don’t understand. Why aren’t there more mind workers in here? There should at least be a few guards. Are they by the front trying to keep people out?” Frustrated, she took off her glasses, polishing them on her sweater, then briefly wiping her eyes. “Come on Sadness. Nobody else is going to help you if you stay here.”

Hearing herself, Sadness wanted nothing more than to fall down in despair on her face again. However, then she sniffed, and just from the extra breath, she felt herself calm down a little. “Joy wouldn’t stop. She’s working so hard to find Riley. And Joy was so sad after we lost our girl.” Sadness slowly rose to her feet, her eyes narrowing in determination. “And I’m going to work just as hard to find the Advanced Console Operations manual. No more crying until I’m done here.” She took a few steps forward. “Even if I have to wander around every hall in this vault, I’m going to find someone to see if they have our manual.” And then, Sadness began jogging off through the corridors, looking left and right for someone to talk to.

Anger looked with surprise at the next obstacle some distance in front of their group. “That trench-coat wearing stranger we saw in San Francisco?”

“Kidnapping is a serious danger,” exclaimed Fear. “He looked suspicious!”

Anger looked back at Fear. “First of all, he looks cool rather than scary. Second, it’s not like we’ve ever seen him again. You really got so spooked that he’s here in the lower levels?”

“Oh yeah!”

Anger sighed in annoyance. “Well, you’re our Fear. I’ll cause a distraction and you two run past him.”

Harry looked at Anger in surprise. “And you’re going to do that…how?”

Anger gave a little grin. “If he’s so dangerous, then he’ll try going after me. As soon as he moves, you two get to the other side. I’ll follow after I drive him off.”

Fear looked at Anger incredulous. “That’s the dumbest plan I’ve ever heard.”

Anger scowled. “Well, do you have any better ideas?”

Fear drummed his fingers briefly, then reached into his pack, and pulled out a soda can. “Once you get his attention, spill this behind you, can and all. He’ll slip and give you time to get away.” Seeing Anger’s annoyed expression, Fear added, “And you can give him a black eye on the way.”

Anger smirked at the thought, and finally nodded. He grabbed the can, and braced himself. “Okay, here we GO!” He charged out of their hiding spot, running straight towards the giant. “Come and get me you shady stranger!” he called as a battle cry.

The tall being turned, and began storming after Anger. Seeing their opening, Fear and Harry ran across the stone plane as fast as they could, heading downhill all the while. Anger saw the two others disappear down the hill, and smiled. “Well, showtime.” He pulled the tab on the can, opening it up, and began dumping it behind himself. While the stranger slightly slipped, he was still coming. So, Anger then tossed the can. It landed right where the stranger’s foot was going, and just like Fear predicted, he slipped, falling with a splat.

Grinning in triumph, Anger turned himself around and ran up to his face. “You’re a phantom sir. And you will never trouble Riley again!” Delivering a punch directly to his face, Anger then jumped off the unconscious stranger, and ran after the other two.

----------

After moving around 4 other fears on their way down, the travelers needed to catch their breaths. Fear, Harry and Anger all took a moment to slump against a particularly large rock shaped like a textbook. Harry in particular seemed winded.

“How…How much farther do we have to go?”

Fear peeked out past where they were. While there was still a great deal of darkness, he did notice something in the distance. A glint of what looked like gold and steel. “I think I see the gate. We’re getting closer.”

Anger gave a sigh of relief. “Ha! And Disgust thought we might need her help to get around down here.”

Fear then gave a nervous chuckle. “Well, we also have a couple branching tunnels coming up too.”

Anger immediately grumbled at the news. “How can you see the gate if there’s tunnels?”

Fear shrugged. “I think I see the top of it past the tunnels.”

Anger sighed. “This place stinks. It’s like both of our worst nightmares. Yours quite literally, and me for how annoying all this stuff is.”

Fear shrugged. “I don’t make the rules, Anger. We’re getting there, but we’re getting towards even scarier stuff.”

Harry glanced beyond the rock himself, and then winced. “Speaking of, look at who’s in our way.”

All three sets of eyeballs peered past the side of their rock. And walking in from the darkness, they saw another giant person coming. But this was someone VERY familiar to them from the last few days.

“Tracy!” Anger’s head immediately started smoking. He looked back at Fear. “You know, I’m actually glad we ran into her. Now I can finally give that no good, arrogant cow exactly what she deserves!”

Fear didn’t like the sound of that. “Anger…”

Anger gave Fear a glare. “Don’t tell me you want to defend that bully from a good punch in the nose.”

Harry stepped between the two emotions before Anger could do something out of hand to Tracy OR Fear. “This isn’t what we came here to do. We’re supposed to get to Riley, not reshape her subconscious constantly.”

Anger’s scowl only deepened. “I can’t let what she did to us all this week go unpunished. It’s not fair how she made everyone think Riley’s crazy!”

Fear and Harry looked at each other, then back to Anger. Fear VERY cautiously replied, “We had to be careful how to tell our class about us, because I didn’t want anyone to go mad from the revelation. And we’re still on the clock Anger.” Seeing his confusion, Fear explained. “When Joy and I passed through Imagination Land, I saw her stream of consciousness going down. That means she’s losing her ability to think. We don’t have time to confront every fear she has.”

Anger crossed his arms with a huff. Then a mischievous smile came on his face. “Well if we’re in such a rush, how about we take a different tact? We walk out there and go directly past Tracy. If she ignores us, no harm no foul. If she confronts us, then we’ll all show her that Riley’s never been alone in her mind. And no bully is ever stronger than all of us together.”

Fear again twitched in terror. But looking at Anger with his fists clenched, Fear steadied himself, dusting off his houndstooth. “Alright. But once we get to the tunnels, we call in for directions. ESPECIALLY if things go bad.” He looked over to Harry. “You in?”

Harry swallowed, but also did his best to stand himself upright. “If I would die for Riley, then I would fight for her too.”

Anger stepped out first, walking casually forward. Fear and Harry were right behind, though carrying themselves with much more tension. At first, nothing happened. However, when they were about ¾ of the way to the 3 split tunnels, a great big THUMP sounded. And before they could properly react, the three were scooped up by this giant Tracy’s hands. Raising them up into eyesight.

“Well, well. If it isn’t the emotions. And look! Riley’s imaginary boyfriend is here too! How lame.”

Fear and Harry started squirming, but both tried to give a stern glare despite the circumstances. Anger though was just resting in her hands. Not moving. Not even bursting into flames oddly enough. He was just staring this Tracy dead in the eyes.

‘Tracy’ continued. “You all thought you could just…walk on past me without any consequences? Don’t you know that Riley’s afraid that I’m right?”

“No. No! You’re wrong. We’re real, and Riley could never-” Fear protested strongly.

“Oh yes. Normal girls don’t hear voices in their head. Normal girls don’t talk with their emotions. Normal girls don’t have mood swings or get tired or distracted. And I’ve only gotten stronger the more times Riley sees me. Taking control of the console? Freaking out? Yelling at others? What makes you think she doesn’t suspect I was right all along?”

“Stop this,” demanded Harry. “We’re here. We’re real. You know we’re real because you’re holding us.”

‘Tracy’ scoffed. “It doesn’t matter what you all say or where we are. Riley is haunted by me, and she can’t let me go. And Fear? Surely you must know you’re the cause of this too. Riley couldn’t be afraid if she didn’t have you after all.”

Fear stopped struggling. His eyes were wide. His lip quivering. “She’s right. I did this. Even if I protested we were real, Riley wouldn’t be afraid if it wasn’t for me. I wanted to keep her safe, but how could I protect her from OUR consequences? Why did it all get so complicated?? What do we do? We’re caught, and Riley’s going to die, and it’s going to be all my-”

“Are you done?”

Everyone turned to look at Anger. He almost looked bored.

“Uh, aren’t you supposed to be screaming right now Anger?” ‘Tracy’ asked in confusion.

Anger began to darkly grin. “Oh I have my nervous moments for sure, but I’m a fighter. And at the end of the day, you’re not scary.”

The being brought Anger closer to her face. “Were you listening to me at all?”

Anger began to smoke. “Oh I heard you. But I don’t think you understand. Fear might be freaked out by everything you’ve said. But to me, you’re not even threatening.” His head started glowing. “Without you, we never would have a new Friendship Island with Ann. You’ve helped Riley even when you didn’t mean to. In the end Tracy, all you’ll ever be is an annoyance. A no good jerk who doesn’t understand everything good Riley now has in her life. And that also includes Us!” Anger began pushing on the thumb, tilting his head forward, looking at Harry and Fear. The two in her other hand also got serious expressions on their faces, and began pushing on their thumb. “ You’ve never treated us fairly. And I promise that when we get out of here, you’ll get exactly what you deserve. Now, LET! US! GO! AAAGGGHHH!” Anger’s head exploded in fire again. And the flames were close enough that it singed Tracy's cheek. In surprise, and thanks to her thumbs now being in an awkward position, all three of the travelers were dropped.

“RUN!” screamed Harry as soon as they got up. And the three sprinted for the tunnels.

“You’ll PAY for that,” came Tracy’s voice behind them.

Fear immediately grabbed for his radio. “This is Fear! We’re nearing some tunnels in the subconscious. We need to know which tunnel to take.”

“Ugh, give me a-”

“We’re being chased! WE need to know it NOW ENNUI!” Fear screamed at the top of his lungs.

“Alright, alright,” came the annoyed voice of emotion on the other end. The tunnels got closer and closer. There was still silence. They were closing in on the space. Fear looked like he was about to sprint for the tunnel on the left; heck with the consequences. But as he was about to go in, a voice came through. “Center. Take the center tunnel. It’ll lead Straight to the barrier between the Subconscious and the Unconscious. Over.” And the group leapt for the middle tunnel, narrowly avoiding fists grasping for them again. They slid down the semi-slippery tunnel for a bit, and were running away as soon as they could stand again.

Anger looked over to Fear. The purple nerve was shaking like a leaf as they hurried down the tunnel. “Well, that didn’t go as planned.” Fear didn’t say anything. Just moving forward without another word. Anger gave Fear a more sympathetic glance. “You…gonna be alright for the rest of our trip, Fear?”

Fear didn’t answer at first. For a good 15 seconds, there was silence in the tunnel. Then Fear quietly said, “Nothing matters until we find Riley. Then we can deal with what comes next.”

Anger didn’t reply to that statement. Only scurrying to keep up with the taller emotion while Harry trailed behind, keeping an eye behind them in case anything came into the tunnel. “Almost there,” Anger mused to himself. “We’re almost to Riley.”

Joy did a small skid as she finally reached the base of the hill, and the entrance to the Forest of Hidden Influences. The funny thing about this forest was how despite it being right near a bright city, nothing seemed to penetrate its shadowy depths. Reaching the edge of the forest, Joy peered in. It was dark, and tangled. And she noticed a few odd memory orbs lying around. Most of them were colored, but she picked up one near herself, she noticed it was grey. This orb fragment featured an image of baby Riley shrinking under her covers. Seemingly scared of the dark.

Joy shivered looking at the image. “Ooh, no wonder we got so scared of the stairs to the basement. We’ve been secretly influenced all this time.” Joy then looked out into the forest, trying her hardest to catch a glimpse of Riley’s form. Unfortunately, she didn’t see anything right away. “Hidden influences indeed. Why isn’t the Unconscious a little more straightforward like Imagination Land?” Nonetheless, Joy began climbing into the brambles at the entrance, and began walking into the forest.

It was a tangle to be sure. Every so often, she’d have to switch directions to move towards a more open path. Sometimes she passed a vine with a memory fragment on it. Sometimes she’d walk by full orbs. The creepiest part was just how quiet the entire forest was. “For being such a dangerous spot, this forest seems pretty clear,” Joy mused to herself. That was about when she stepped on what felt like a pine cone. “Ow!” But after picking it up, she noticed it was another memory fragment. This one has part of an image of Riley knocking her first bowl of broccoli into the air. “Oh. Totally forgot about this one. I bet Disgust would love to make this the centerpiece of her room if she got a chance.” Joy chuckled to herself thinking of Disgust’s smug reaction. Then she noticed how the memory was completely grey. “Not that it could be remembered,” she then mumbled, stepping to the side and continuing forward.

Joy then saw something silvery on the path ahead. She quickly moved up, and found a soul memory right there on the pathway. “What is-” Joy began speaking. But she quickly stopped when she heard the voice coming from it.

“There’s nothing I have out there that I can’t have in here.”

Joy swallowed deep. She rewound the memory again, but there wasn’t anything before Riley’s declaration before everything went haywire. Joy then noticed the memory was silvery white like all soul memories, but also red and blue. “Blue? Riley was…sad when she said this?” Joy hugged the memory briefly. “I’m sorry Riley. We can talk about this as soon as I find you.” Then Joy realized something. “Wait, how did this memory get here? Sadness tried to send Riley’s memories to long term before we left headquarters. Unless…”

Joy hurried forward down the dirt path, coming up over a crest in the forest, and then gasped. It was part of the old Headquarters Building. Collapsed by the side of what looked like a lake.

“It broke apart??” Joy sat down in shock. Seeing her home like this…it wasn’t a good feeling at all. She never felt closer to Riley than she did right now as she began to understand what it meant to never be able to go home like Riley did when she left Minnesota. She briefly swallowed. “Joy…” Joy pivoted her head. “I know mom! I just….give me a minute, okay?” Joy took a few deep breaths. Then Joy put the memory she was holding down, and dragged herself to the side again. “It’ll be okay, Joy. You’ll build a new home once we fix this.” Joy walked back, and had a pleading look in her eyes. “But it still hurts! This hurts so much! That was MY home for twelve years.” Joy swallowed, and then screamed out something she finally realized. “And I can’t do this anymore!” She glared at the air, even while she had to sit down for a moment. “You helped when we needed to try a new slide, or make up with Meg in 3rd grade, or began the first day of middle school. But this hurts as much as when we lost Bing Bong! I had to go on then, and I have to go on now, but you aren’t enough anymore. I need someone REAL to be here for me. Not just someone I’ve created!”

She sniffed. Then dragged herself to her feet again. “I can’t…I can’t rely on you anymore Mom. And maybe I’ll never have the family I want.” She took one more deep breath, and looked away from where she almost imagined her mom was, gazing out over the lake. “But I’m not going to lose the family I already have. And I know Riley’s here somewhere. I just have to-” Out of the corner of her eye, Joy saw a glimmer. She turned towards it on instinct, and then suddenly, she saw it. On the far right side of the lake. What looked like a glimmer of white light was barely visible from where she was standing, but Joy could tell. Joy knew exactly who she saw. “Look…for the light.”

Chapter Text

Chapter 10: Tabula Rasa

Joy hurriedly grabbed up the soul memory next to her, and began making her way down the hill. She was moving towards where she saw the light, but reaching it was much more difficult than expected. She had to climb over logs, weave through some vines, and even avoid a few broken memory orbs to get closer. After about 25 minutes, she finally reached the beach by the “lake”.

Joy squinted a bit, and there, standing by a log on a slightly elevated piece of ground, was a glowing white Riley. She was holding what looked like another memory, looking all around. Riley’s energy form didn’t seem to be flickering like when Headquarters started collapsing. Strangely enough, Riley was now in the outfit she wore the day she almost ran away. An all black jacket and dark pants combination. But at that moment, Joy didn’t care. Riley could’ve been wearing a clown outfit, and it would’ve been the most beautiful thing ever. It was their girl. And Joy could finally save her.

Joy started sprinting as fast as she could, dropping the soul memory on the beach as she sprinted around the shore of the lake towards Riley. She actually felt herself start bounding, not slowing down until she was almost directly in Riley’s face.

“RILEY! OH THANK GOODNESS, YOU’RE OKAY!”

But Riley didn’t respond the way Joy hoped. Instead, she tripped over backwards, still holding what Joy now recognized as Possibility Island’s Core memory. She looked up at Joy with incomprehension. And Joy also finally saw the tear streaks on her cheeks. In a small, scared voice, Riley asked, “Who..who are you?”

Joy immediately felt a chill go down her body, but it couldn’t stop her exuberance at first. “It’s me Riley. Joy! You know, your emotion?”

Riley just blinked owlishly and uneasily at her. “I…I don’t understand. Why are you calling me Riley?”

Joy stopped for a moment, then recovered herself in a snap. “I..that’s your name isn’t it? Who do you think you are?”

Riley looked down. “I don’t know. If I did have a name, I..I think I forgot it.”

Joy crouched down to Riley’s level, keeping a smile still on her face, but now much more quiet. “But…you’re Riley Andersen. From Minnesota.”

Riley scooted away again, now finding a seat on the log near them. “What are you talking about?”

Joy swallowed. This was really bad. Joy at least expected a little yelling from Riley. This was actually worse. How..how could Riley not remember her own life? "C-Come on, Riley," Joy whispered, holding the girl's hand. "Minnesota? Remember Minnesota?"

Riley blinked and sniffled, tugging her hand away and staring at Joy in a fearful incomprehension as she wiped tears away with her sleeve. "Wha...What's Minnesota?"

"The place where you used to live..." Joy felt her chest tighten, forcing out a smile as she pleaded with her eyes to have Riley remember anything about her life. "Do you remember the lake where you used to skate and play hockey with Mom and Dad? Or when Meg would come over?"

Riley shook her head, looking as lost as ever and clutching to the soul memory like it was her only friend. Even the words "Mom" and "Dad" seemed to hold no meaning for her.

'Please tell me I'm having a nightmare', Joy thought before desperately trying again. "San Francisco?"

"What's that?"

Joy's expression faltered. As attempting to remain perky was becoming harder. If Riley didn't remember her own family here... "Okay, come on, h-hockey! You remember hockey, right?"

Riley shook her head.

Joy searched for something more recent. "Ann? Jordan?"

Nothing.

Joy sat next to her. If a Human World memory wouldn't come to her here, maybe a Mind World memory would. Her eyes darting for a moment, her expression lit up as she pointed to the memory that Riley clutched to her chest. "Remember when you performed impressions of us? And created Possibility Island?"

Riley sighed, looking down and wrapping her coat around herself. She gazed at the orb, but it was as if she wasn't really focusing on it. Her brow then furrowed, wracking her brain to try to come up with any recollection. But no matter how much she searched her mind, it didn't seem she could recall much of anything that would help her. At least not as far as Joy could see in her eyes.

The young human was broken out of her attempts at thought by feeling a warm hand wrap around hers. She looked up, staring into Joy's eyes, the emotion’s gaze worried. Despite her concern, Joy still knew they could get things back to normal. They had to. Everything might’ve become a mess after all they went through this week, but Joy still believed she could fix this. No matter where they'd have to go.

"We have to get you out of here."

Riley’s lip quivered. “But..why should I? I don’t know who you are, where we need to go. I don’t even know who I am!” Riley could feel the tears still playing at the edge of her eyes.

Joy kept her steady gaze and a steady hand despite feeling on the edge of breaking down herself. “Well, if we go together, maybe we can figure everything out. We’re all getting out of this.”

That phrase sparked something in Riley. She tilted her head slightly. “I…I remember…something. It seems so distant but…I remember being so upset. I was mad at myself. I was mad at…you. But, I wanted so badly to prove I mattered that I couldn’t forgive myself for....for…” Riley trailed off. “I don’t know if I’ll like who I am if I remember.”

Joy really did feel her heart stop for a second. But, she still used all her willpower to bring a smile back to her face.  “Maybe, but there are so many others who want the old you back.” Joy gave a light squeeze to Riley’s hand. “Come on. We can’t stay here.”

Riley briefly wiped her eyes. Then hugged the soul memory close to her again as she scooted down the log a little farther, letting go of Joy’s hand. “Can we stay here a few more minutes? I’m not ready to go yet.”

Joy wanted so badly to pull Riley up and start moving, but she couldn’t force this. Not in Riley’s current state. So, she scooted closer to Riley. “Okay. I’ll be right here whenever you’re ready.”

Riley stared out over the lake, while occasionally glancing down at the memory in her hands. As the seconds ticked by, Riley began to smile slightly. This bright orb made things seem a little less scary in this dark forest. However, Riley also began to notice the slight glow of Joy right next to her. And feeling something else rising up from her memories, she nuzzled a bit into Joy’s shoulder, trying to mentally prepare herself. Joy, seeing Riley rest her head, wrapped an arm around her. It definitely wasn’t the hug she expected to give their girl, but she was here. And now, they just needed to get back to the others.

Disgust and Envy walked in silence for a while. After Disgust’s outburst, neither said anything as they got further across the memory dump. Unfortunately, Envy’s concerns were well founded. There was quite a bit of sag in the tarp at this distance from both sides. Still, despite needing to partially scramble towards more firm areas, the two emotions were able to keep moving forward. In fact, Envy was moving a little faster since she didn’t leave as big an indent in the tarp.

Disgust glared a little at the ‘kid’ now ahead of herself. “Why didn’t you just go across by yourself? You’re small enough not to cause as much trouble.”

Envy looked back, her eyes now with a lingering uncertainty. “I didn’t want to. Who would I emulate if I was going by myself?”

Disgust rolled her eyes. “What makes others so important to you? You sound pretty insecure.”

Envy turned away, still moving forward while talking. “Who do you think I am, Disgust? I’m not Fear or Joy.”

“So?”

“So, my job is to make sure Riley knows what she should want from life or others. I want to be like the best people around.”

Disgust gave a confused frown at that. “And…you wanted to work with me after I found you?”

Envy turned to look at Disgust again, nodding vigorously. “I already told you: you’re the prettiest and smartest emotion I’ve ever wanted to meet.”

Disgust gave an annoyed exhale. “Come on Envy. Sadness is much smarter than I am. She had the time and patience to actually read the mind manuals.”

Envy shrugged. “Sadness took the time, but she doesn’t know how to use it unless you all ask.”

Disgust frowned deeper. “Well, Fear is obsessive about knowing all about everything around us, and acts on it quickly.”

Envy gave a slight chuckle. “Fear’s a worrywort. He acts quickly, but overreacts.”

Disgust began to see where this was going, but still wasn’t willing to accept it. “If you think being smart is all about knowing when and how to act, Anger and Joy are the first to go after ideas. They’re much smarter and more useful compared to…” Disgust swallowed. “Compared to me.”

Envy didn’t let up. “Joy wants so badly for things to be good, she doesn’t see problems until they hit. And do you really want to talk about Anger? It’s his fault we got to this point.”

Disgust now got hard eyes. “We all got into this situation, Envy. Anger might’ve broken the intercom, but none of us are guiltless in how we got here. I mean, if Riley didn’t hear me talking about my scarf, Ann never would’ve asked about us and started our school troubles.”

Envy then looked right at Disgust with a triumphant grin. “Well if you’re all responsible for getting into this, then why don’t you have an idea for when Riley wakes up?”

Disgust gave an exasperated sigh. “Really? We’re going back to this again?” 

Envy took a step closer to the much taller emotion. “I just don’t get why you don’t even want to try. I know you can be a leader, so why not lead us out of this?”

Disgust then thought of something. “Why do you even think that? How would you know what we get up to if we’ve never met before the evacuation?”

Envy gave a little chuckle. “We have monitors downstairs. So when Riley’s ready for us, we can come upstairs. I’ve seen all you’ve done this last week.” Envy then smiled with an awestruck look. “You connected with Riley instantly when you first spoke to her. You helped make her laugh when drawing. You tried to keep Riley calm during lockout day. You directed Fear on Tuesday night. You used a little bite to protect Riley on Wednesday. So what makes you think you’re no good for Riley once we get everything back together?”

Disgust looked down. “It’s easy for me to appear confident. To put a little bite into stupidity. But, I make mistakes too. Like deciding Anger was right about Riley being happier in Minnesota. Or not being encouraging enough when Mom and Dad went snooping into Riley’s room. I tried to keep Riley sane, safe and calm. But, Riley didn’t listen. And…I still don’t think I deserve to say anything. I feel…disgusted with myself.”

Envy sighed, seeing they were right back to Disgust’s personal issues from before. Breaking off eye contact, Envy looked around the mind world, desperately trying to think of something, anything to hold onto. And then, she looked at the remaining standing Islands of Personality. Possibility, Honesty, Isolation. And the gaping hole in the middle where Family Island used to be. And that’s when it hit her. The examples Disgust needed to snap out of her pity party.  “Well, maybe you’re right.”

Disgust looked up. “What?”

Envy feigned a sad face. “If Riley truly feels alone in the world, then there’s nothing you or I can do to change her. Maybe she was wrong to think of us as part of possibilities for the future.”

Disgust now looked confused. “That doesn’t sound like you.”

Envy snorted. “Well, if you don’t want to put in the effort to help Riley, why should I?” Disgust opened her mouth to reply, but Envy went on. “I mean, it’s not like Riley thinks that being in the mind world is the most special thing in the world. The one thing she could see everyone else get jealous of.”

Disgust blinked. “But she does! At least, it’s her safe space after the dangers outside.”

Envy then gave a shy smile. “So you think we’re part of something really special? Something Riley would never give up?”

Disgust swallowed. “Maybe? We might not always get things right, but we’re a part of her. Riley needs us to live right.”

“And you DON’T want to help her save that?”

“I do! That’s why I’m here.”

Envy began to give a cunning smile. “But you said you thought maybe it’d be best to do what Mom and Dad want.”

Disgust gave a disgruntled groan. “Well, it’s not like we’ve been doing great outside. Mom and Dad are great! They love us, and help us so much even if we can’t always show it.”

Envy saw her triumph coming into view. “You’re right. They are great, even if they don’t share our talents. But there’s one thing you could do which they already did for us last year!”

Disgust could feel her patience running out. “Oh really? And what’s that???”

“You could forgive yourself!”

Disgust’s eyes went wide with incomprehension. Then she blinked in surprise. “Forgive…myself?”

Envy now got all the way to Disgust’s feet, her big eyes filled with worry, but also compassion looking up at her. “Emotions can’t quit. Riley needs us all, so why don’t you forgive yourself? Give yourself a clean slate? Mom and Dad forgave Riley for almost running away.” Seeing Disgust's still conflicted face, Envy said one last thing. “And didn’t you forgive yourself then too?”

Disgust looked down, crossing her arms, and thinking about that week after Joy and Sadness returned to Headquarters. And finally in defeat, she sighed. “Yeah. I guess I did. Everything happened so fast I didn’t give myself time to regret once Joy and Sadness got back.” She then picked up Envy. “How did we end up talking about this?”

Envy shrugged. “I followed Riley’s lead with her islands. Even if Family Island isn’t standing now, I think we all need some self forgiveness before we wake up.”

Disgust took in a deep breath, then hugged Envy close, releasing the tension she didn’t realize she was carrying. “Well, I’ll…think about it.” Envy patted her shoulder briefly. Then Disgust dropped Envy, giving her a hard look. “Don’t tell ANY of the others about this talk.”

Envy gave a starry eyed smile. “You’re asking ME to keep a special secret? YES! Absolutely!”

Disgust rolled her eyes a bit, but smiled too. “Thank you Envy. Now let’s get off this thing. This tarp is so icky to walk on!” She immediately picked up her pace, with Envy again scrambling to keep up.

Anger, Fear and Harry emerged from their tunnel. They had to call in for help because of a tunnel split mid journey, but thankfully nothing seemed to follow them down this far. As they came out, they looked over the space outside the tunnel. There were quite a few large rocks around the area. They were all images of various mundane things like a giant test score with an F on it, or a hockey puck flying towards a stone Riley’s face. It was quite the jumble, with small paths between the formations. But out beyond all the rocks was a giant gold and silver gate with a small lock in the middle. On top was a sign that read THE UNCONSCIOUS: LOCK UP BEFORE YOU GO!

Fear gave a mild sigh of relief. “We made it.” Looking at the rock sculptures, he gave a little shudder. “These are all things that could be in the subconscious and unconscious. Thank goodness they aren’t alive.”

Harry meanwhile looked around before declaring, “I don’t like this.” Anger and Fear turned to the imaginary boyfriend, as he looked back with a stressed expression. “We should see Riley's deepest fears, but I don’t see anyone or anything like what we passed through to get here. No Jangles, no knives. I don’t like how this gate looks unguarded.”

Fear grew more and more freaked out the longer he listened. “You’re right. But…I don’t know what else could be this far down. Tracy I could understand being here, but she was right before the tunnels.” He looked around again, but saw seemingly nothing. “Why isn’t there anything here?”

Anger suddenly pointed. “Hey, who’s that?”

The three looked toward the gate. And there they saw…

“Joy?”

Despite their own hesitation, all three hurried down towards the gate. Joy was on the other side, seemingly holding onto the bars. Too big to slip through the narrow gaps. Finally the three reached a slightly open clearing right in front of the gate.

“What are you doing here? How did you get here anyways?” asked Harry.

Joy gave a pleading look. “I got lost and turned around. Please, do you have the key to open up the gate?”

Anger beckoned for Fear. Fear began reaching to his pack to get the key out. But as he did, Fear suddenly paused. His eyes shook in concern. “Hold on a second. Joy, where’s Bing Bong Jr?”

Joy looked distraught, but said, “We split up. We had to find Riley, and I barely made it here. The Unconscious is a weird space.”

Fear now had a rising sense of panic. He again reached for his zipper, but then another thought came to mind. “Wait...how do I know you’re really Joy and not just some abstract fear trying to use us to get out?”

Joy lightly shook the gate. “Come on Fear. It’s me! We worked together for so long, how could you not know it’s me?”

Harry spoke up, noticing how ‘Joy’ didn’t answer the question. “What did Disgust tell me to do before I could be Riley’s boyfriend?”

Joy blinked. “That…you needed a personality and a haircut? Why so defensive?”

Harry looked at both Anger and Fear. “I haven’t known Joy for THAT long. Before we open the gate, ask her one more thing only one of you would know.”

Anger now narrowed his own eyes, “If you really are Joy, what’s something we talked about when I took you on break?”

Joy stammered for a second. “That…you regret breaking the intercom a little? Come on Anger, don’t waste time, we have to go find Riley.”

Seeing Anger’s surprised look, Fear finally pulled out the key. He looked ready to put it in the lock, but felt Anger’s hand. Looking at him, Anger moved his eyebrows, indicating he should ask a question too. Fear bit his lip in uncertainty, but then asked, “Joy, what did I say one of my secret desires was?”

Joy quickly replied with confidence. “That Riley would get a job of perfect safety when she grows up.”

Fear jolted, and took a few steps backwards. The other two noticed his expression was now a glare and a frown. Fear now spoke with a stiff anger. “I told you how sometimes I wanted to be like you . Someone who can see not just the dangers but the way forward.” Fear then crossed his arms, the key in his left hand. “You’re not really Joy, are you?”

‘Joy’ stepped back. For a moment, there was a hurt look on her face. But then, that look morphed into a smile. A dark, sinister smile, and ‘Joy’ started to laugh. At first it was a small kind of chuckling laugh like how Anger sometimes heard her make in her sleep, but it grew deeper, and deeper. And more and more aggressive. Until ‘Joy’ was doubled over in laughter. “HaHaHaHaHaHa…”

And then, it changed. It grew, the dress on “Joy” tore a little, and her eyes turned red. The hair grew into a multicolored tangle, and her arms became clawed and longer so they dropped all the way to the ground. Then it spoke again, but this time, it was like her voice was running through a phonograph that distorted it into something much deeper and scary. “Well, well. And here I thought you’d fall for fearful sob stories so easily.” The being smiled, and there were sharp teeth that stuck out. “ No matter. I knew if I hung around here, I’d FORCE things to change.”

All three mind beings on the Subconscious side took a step back. Even Anger, despite himself, felt terrified looking at this mockery of the Joy they knew. But, he stepped to the front, looking this terrifying monster in the face. “Then what’s your real name?”

“I’m Paranoia. You could also call me your daughter.”

That made Fear gasp. Anger though gave an annoyed scoff despite everything. “I think I’d remember if I had a kid this big.”

“Don’t mock me!” Paranoia rattled the gate briefly, leading the three to take several more steps back towards the tunnels. “ You and Fear together made me. I got dropped down here from Abstract Thought this week, and it was all because Riley was so worried and angry at the world. She needed ME to make sense of it, but you all shoved me down here instead. Cowards.”

Harry looked very confused at this. “Guys, what is she talking about?”

Fear looked at Harry. “I….”

Paranoia began rattling the gate, growing louder and louder. “Go on. Tell him how Riley began to worry about anyone knowing about talking to her emotions. Emotions of all things! Tell him how she started to think she had to take over YOUR jobs because you hurt her last year. Tell him how Riley thought she might actually have schizophrenia because everything from this last week EXACTLY matches the symptoms. How she almost swore at her best friend because she thought she wasn’t actually going to help her. How she hated her parents because she believed they weren’t going to care about her. HOW SHE TURNED ON YOU ALL BECAUSE SHE DIDN’T TRUST THE WORLD ANYMORE!! All she’ll ever need is ME, and you deny me that? Stop pretending you’re good for Riley and LET ME OUT!” Paranoia then struck the gate, causing a loud clang to rock over the area.

Anger scowled in response. “Riley certainly went through a lot, but if you’re going to say such awful things about her, then you definitely belong down here! Riley can get confused, but she still trusted she had friends! She had courage to tell the truth about the test! She-”

“No. Paranoia's right.”

Everyone looked at Fear, who was looking down, despondent.

“I was so scared of our new reality, I didn’t even think about how it might make Riley believe her own mind would be the safest place to hide. A…paranoid delusion.” Fear looked up again. A hollow tone to his voice. “This is all our fault. We made this….thing in Riley and now….we’re stuck. There’s no way we can get past Paranoia and keep our promise to lock the gate.”

Harry crossed his arms. “Nothing Paranoia said is something we didn’t pick up on in Imagination Land. We knew about her plan to stay here forever before all you did.” Harry then looked up at Paranoia. “And how did you get all the way to the gate?”

Paranoia gave a toothy grin. “When Riley tried to lock herself in, that’s when I decided to leave my ‘space’. Try to get out. But unlike Narcissism, Loneliness or Spite, I wasn’t going to sneak out through the belief system or wait for Riley to bring us out all the way herself. I was going to get out as a PROPER emotion. If I come through the Subconscious, I can get all the way into Riley’s conscious mind and make sure she NEVER lets her guard down to trust someone again.” Then she smiled even bigger. “ And speaking of Proper Emotions…” She whistled really loud, the sound echoing over the Subconscious. “ I’d say you have…5 minutes before my help arrives to get that KEY.”

All three of the travelers quickly slipped out of sight, regrouping behind a rock sculpture of Riley cringing at something or other.

Fear slumped down. “You know, giving up doesn’t feel so bad an idea now.”

Harry nodded. “We’re not equipped to deal with Paranoia. We’d be fed to her like a cookie!”

Anger promptly slammed Fear’s head into the rock formation, and gave Harry a dope slap. “Don’t you quit on me now Cowards! We just have to think of a way to get through the gate and lock it once we get through.”

Fear gave an incredulous look. “HOW? We don’t even know who Paranoia is going to call in against us. And if we get caught by them, the gate will be left open, and Riley will never trust another person again! Not even us!”

Anger frowned in frustration. He looked out, seeming to spot something coming. Then he looked at Fear. “I don’t suppose you have binoculars in that emergency pack of yours?”

Fear unslung the pack, and started digging through it. The rope, the ruler, a clamp, some glue, a can of mace and other assorted survival items came flying out. Until at last, Fear had Binoculars in hand. Anger grabbed them, climbing up onto Riley’s stone face, looking out for Paranoia’s ‘help’. He grumbled to himself as he scanned the horizon, until he finally saw something. He gasped, and quietly came down.

“What did you see?” asked Harry quickly. Anger now looked shocked and didn’t answer.

“Anger?” Fear nervously inquired.

Anger looked at the two of them, but now he looked like all the fight in him had ebbed away. “It’s us.”

“What?”

“I saw other versions of us coming here. Another you. Another me. Another Disgust. It’s us. Riley…Riley’s afraid of us.”

Fear now realized what Anger was saying, and promptly slumped down to his feet. “Riley…” he moaned.

Harry though had a new look on his face. A contemplative look. “Okay, that’s definitely something to unpack later. But, if it’s other versions of you all? It actually gives me an idea.”

Anger and Fear looked at Harry with indecision. “What’s the point?” Fear moaned. “This is proof Riley doesn’t trust us anymore. Whatever reason she has for being afraid of us, how do we ever get Riley’s trust back? Look how much I….We hurt her.”

Harry now got down to their level. “Don’t quit on me now you two! Remember Possibility Island? As long as that’s standing, Riley still cares about you all.” Harry then gestured to himself. “Look at me. I’ve been trying to be Riley’s best boyfriend, and I still feel like a fraud. But I have something in me to keep going. To show I would die for Riley. To prove how much I love her.” Harry then offered two hands to the emotions. “We’re so close. And I have an idea of how to get in.”

Fear and Anger looked at each other. Both nervously took a hand, and stood up.

Harry then gave a slight smile. “Okay, this is going to be really risky, but it’s the best way I see us reaching the Unconscious and locking the gate like Captain Jonas wanted.” Anger and Fear leaned in. As they listened, Fear still had a nervous look, but Anger now gave a smile. This was the kind of plan he’d always get behind.

Fear asked one question. “What if they figure out the plan?”

Harry frowned. “Well, then we better hope Paranoia is slow. But as long as we get through and lock the door behind us, then we’ll figure out a new plan once we’re safe.”

Fear swallowed, but nodded. “Okay. Let’s do it!”

Five emotions walked up to the gate. They looked exactly like the five main emotions from upstairs. Same outfits, same colors. They were even roughly the same size. However, just looking at their eyes and posture, you could tell they were nothing like the emotions. Smug and taunting smiles sat on their faces as they came up to Paranoia. And their eyes were red and yellow rather than normal white.

“So what’s the plan, Boss?” asked the ‘Fear’.

Paranoia pointed out among the rocks. “The Key is somewhere out there. Fear has it, but Anger and that imaginary boyfriend are around here too. I need you to get the key by any means necessary.”

‘Joy’ gave a little salute. “You got it. Spread out everyone. Call it out when you find them.”

The five spread out among the rocks, peeking behind, inside and through the various formations. And as they began moving they began making taunting jabs.

“Come on!” ‘Joy’ chuckled out loud. “Just come out and play. Am I really that scary? It’ll be fun. Isn’t it Joyful to know the truth?” She saw something thin run in one direction, and began peeling away from the others.

“You aren’t needed anymore,” ‘Anger’ proclaimed as he checked behind a sculpture of Riley running from her friends. “You did your best to help Riley, but the truth is she needs US now instead. Once I get hold of you, Anger, I’ll be there to make sure Riley takes care of ANYONE who gets in her way.” He then heard a rock fall, and began drifting towards the rocks near the tunnel.

“We’re-always-gonna-be-here!” said ‘Fear’ in a sing-song tone. “No matter how close you all get with Riley, no matter what she might say, we will always be here. Now that she knows about you, there will ALWAYS be some part of her that believes you’re controlling her.” ‘Fear’ then noticed a ruler lying on the ground. He picked it up with confusion, then began drifting parallel to ‘Anger’.

“And you two are the biggest failures of all!” This came from ‘Disgust’ who jumped over to look behind a giant meteor. “You Anger…who kept wanting to get her into fights. And You Fear, who always kept her running away from her problems!” She gave a disgruntled snort not seeing any of them. “Once we get out too, we’ll make sure all the other emotions are taken care of. Then Paranoia and Fear will truly control Riley.” She moved in another direction.

“And there’s no place for boyfriends in our world,” added ‘Sadness’. “We’ll probably toss you and your machine in the dump once we get a chance.”

“ It’ll be great,” they all said in unison. As the different fear-emotions were so spread out from each other at this point, their voices echoed throughout the stone formations.  “ We’ll play with Riley forever and ever and ever..”

“YOU PARASITES!”

All of them turned to see Anger standing by a rock shaped like Riley screaming. His head was already flaming, and he looked like he wanted to strangle something.

“You will NEVER lay ONE grimy hand on OUR GIRL! WE LOVE her, and SHE LOVES US! AND IF YOU WANT TO TRY..” Anger then gestured with his hand towards the other ‘Anger’, who was closest to him. His tone became cold and menacing. “Come and get me!”

‘Anger’ charged at the emotion, trying to grapple him. As the Fear-Emotion tried to pin Anger down, Anger flipped him over his shoulder. Then jumped straight at him, beginning to pound him in the face. All the while, hollering, “RILEY’S! OUR! FRIEND! You don’t get to hurt her!” The fight then became a more proper grappling match, as the two red beings wrestled with each other, before Anger rolled them behind a massive formation of Riley walking away from pointing figures, pretty close to the tunnel out.

‘Joy’ shouted, “Fear, get after him! And see if the others from upstairs are there.”

‘Fear’ scurried towards the space ‘Anger’ had gone, racing out of view of the others. Only to find his counterpart and Harry waiting on the other side, holding a rope between them.

“Surprise!” Harry said quietly, as they jumped for the ‘Fear’.

Some sounds of surprise followed. Some grunts, a sound of a blowtorch going off. The formation shook a couple times, and all the while, the other fear-emotions were trying to reach the sounds of the fight. Weaving through the formations, trying to get to the others.

Then, things became quiet. Reaching the rocks, the other fear-emotions almost hurried behind them, only for a Fear and an Anger to step out, holding Harry between them. The Fear also held up the key in his hand.

“Got it.”

‘Disgust’ gave them a scrutinizing look. “And…where are the emotions from upstairs?”

The Anger pointed behind himself. “Ran back into the tunnels. We’ll catch up with them after we let Paranoia out.”

‘Sadness’ also gave the cluster a look of confusion, but shrugged. “Okay. Let’s open it up.”

The group walked down, with Harry struggling between them all. “You can’t do this! I would die for Riley! Riley needs others!”

‘Joy’ scoffed. “All Riley ever needs is us. Why do you think she wanted to stay here forever?”

The Anger and the Fear flinched slightly, but both chuckled at the words. Harry though gave an angry glare. “I’m living proof that Riley wants more. I’m her imaginary boyfriend. If she wants all ‘you’ so much, then she could have even more.”

‘Anger’ snickered. “Well, we give our girl what she wants. And I bet she’ll throw you out once she gives up all control on her own life. Let us rule her as we ought to.”

Returning to the gate, the Fear reached the key up to the lock, and with a click, opened the gate so it was just wide enough for him and the other two next to them to get through. The other emotions started to move back, as Paranoia started to move forward.

However, right at that moment, a shout went up. “Stop those 3!” Several eyes went up towards the rocks, seeing another Fear and Anger hopping towards them. They were tied together with rope, stuck together with glue, and clamped together with a clamp.

For one terrible moment, everyone looked at the three mind beings right in the middle of the gate. Then the Fear looked at the other two and nodded. He tossed Harry the key, then Fear and Anger ran to close the gate from the inside. As soon as the bars came together, Harry immediately locked the gate before anyone else could reach them.

“You DARE to trick ME!??” Paranoia shouted. She immediately reached for the three of them. However, they then scattered. Paranoia reached for them all, but could only grab Anger and Fear. But not before Fear threw his radio to Harry.

“Harry, RUN! Find Joy. Don’t let them get the key!”

Harry gave a harrowing glance back at the two emotions, then took off. Shouting as he went, “I’ll save you both somehow!”

Paranoia looked after the escaping Harry, then at the two emotions in her hands. “How did you get your eyes to match the others??”

Anger gave a mocking grin. “We sprayed ourselves with mace. It’s too late for you now, daughter. You’re staying right where you belong!”

Paranoia snarled. “I don’t need to catch Harry yet. As long as I have you two, Riley can’t be angry or scared without also having me. You’re coming with me. I know just the place to keep you two for now.”

Both emotions gulped, as Paranoia began stalking off into the Unconscious. Heading towards a green swirl, carrying an emotion in each hand.

Chapter Text

Chapter 11: Deepest Darkest Thoughts

Joy was moving through the forest. Riley held one of her hands, and the other soul memory was in her other. They were making their way out, but it was slow going. The forest was still dark and hard to navigate, which was strange since Egopolis was so bright on the way in.

Joy also had to make sure to not over pace Riley. While not hurt, she had to stop every so often to catch her breath. At least Riley didn’t look like she wanted to run off on her own. Keeping very close to Joy as they went, clutching her core memory close to the chest.

Finally, they came to a creek. Looking downstream, they noticed that it flowed into a cliff face with some small holes in it. Joy frowned, thinking they’d hit a dead end. However, she then saw an orb flow down the creek. She stopped it with her foot, only to see…

“Riley struggling with homework?” Joy looked back to where they came, remembering that the forest did have a part of headquarters inside. She gave a gasp or realization, letting the memory flow down through the tunnel ahead. “We’re here!”

Riley cluelessly asked, “Where’s here?”

Joy smiled back. “I think The Belief System is just beyond this wall. We’ll be safe there.” She led Riley towards the hole the creek was flowing into. It looked a little cramped, but still enough space to move through. She looked at Riley. “Hold my hand, and don’t let go. And if you lose my grip, just look for the glow.”

Riley gave a small nod of uncertainty, then the two began their crouched walk.

Though the pathway ahead was dark, the overall trip wasn’t that long. After only two minutes, they finally broke through. And once they could stretch their legs properly, they both gave a little gasp of awe.

Inside was a cavern. There were colored memory orbs floating around in a pool of water. And right near those orbs were huge white strings which stretched up into the ceiling. The entire area had a purple glow to it, but looked deserted. A central column was in the middle of the cavern, colored white. And there was a peaceful atmosphere aside from one darker corner of the space.

Splashing through the water, keeping their memory orbs above their heads, Joy and Riley reached an island right underneath the threads with the column anchored dead center. Both off them sat down for another moment to rest.

Riley looked up at the threads that seemed to stretch out of sight. “Where do all those go?”

Joy gave a slight shug. “I’m not sure. We’re supposed to be right below where Headquarters would be. But I’m not sure where these threads will go if Headquarters is gone.”

Joy then approached one of the threads. “These must be your beliefs,” she mused. And full of curiosity, Joy plucked it.

“Mom and Dad are proud of me.” The voice sounded like a younger Riley.

“Huh,” mused Joy with a smile. “That is an old one.” She then plucked another next to it.

“I’m pretty.”

Because Joy was now focused on the threads, she didn’t notice Riley staring intently at the sounds coming out. Her expression gradually became more and more troubled, hearing different versions of her voice come from the strings.

Joy then started to pluck even more.

“I’m strong.”

“I’m brave.”

“I’m great at Hockey.”

However, then Joy came to a cluster of threads that looked a little different. Instead of being blue or white, these were black or grey. “What in…” Hesitantly, Joy reached out, and plucked one of the strings.

“I’m a mess.”

Joy gulped at that. She nearly walked away, but couldn’t help herself. So, she plucked the other grey threads of the group.

“No other human will really know me.”

“Everyone’s out to get me.”

“Inside my mind is better than the outside.”

Joy heard a little gasp behind her. She turned and saw Riley now standing with an open mouth. Joy quickly grew nervous. They stared at each other, neither quite knowing what to say. Finally, Riley spoke first.

“Joy, am…am I Inside my own MIND???”

Joy blinked. Then gave an awkward chuckle, and release of breath. “Oh. Right. If you didn’t remember your life, how would you know where we are?” Riley didn’t laugh. “Yes, you’re inside your mind.”

Riley looked all around, shocked. “Why…why does my mind look so…weird?”

Joy shrugged. “We’re in your Unconscious right now. This is where all your abstract fears are kept. And apparently, it’s also near where your beliefs are.”

Riley held herself, shivering. “I don’t know whether to be scared or amazed.” Joy reached for her, but Riley took a step back. “Not now….Joy. I’m still trying to accept this.”

Joy, despite Riley’s words, still smiled. “Well, I did say I was your emotion. I just want to be sure you’re handling this alright.”

Riley bit her lip, but looked both fascinated and hesitant. “I..guess it slipped my mind since I was so scared of not knowing who I am.” She briefly tilted her head. “Although, you do look like a Joy.” Riley then moved past Joy. She walked over to the grey strings, and the one other thread Joy hadn’t touched yet. It was a sickly, black thread with less tension than the others. Riley tentatively reached out, and gave it a pluck.

“I’m a Freak and a Monster!”

Riley recoiled right into Joy’s arms with a gasp. Looking up at Joy, both Riley and Joy’s faces were filled with horror. Riley shakily asked, “This…THIS is what I believed??”

Joy swallowed. “I didn’t know.” She then gestured to all the dark threads. “I didn’t know you believed in…THIS now!”

Riley hastily got out of Joy’s arms, backing away towards the central column in fear and distress. “I don’t want this. I don’t want to think I believed these things! I wish I could-”

“Wait!” Riley stopped talking, seeing Joy hold a hand out. “We’re still in your Unconscious! I don’t want you to conscious tamper down here.”

“Huh?”

“You can change parts of yourself from the inside, but we were warned to not do it in the Unconscious. You could damage yourself even more than in the rest of your mind.”

Riley again looked at the grey and black threads, her expression now growing harder. “But I don’t want to believe such…AWFUL things! I want them gone! Even if I don’t remember believing this, I don’t want to believe it now!”

The offending threads began to tremble, as if they were about to snap. Several grey and black memory orbs began rising up from the water. And the cavern began to shake with the sound of falling rocks. But before anything could break or be moved, Joy grabbed onto Riley’s now pointing hand. “So do I! But we have to do this right. I don’t want to accidentally break your mind by doing shortcuts.” Seeing Riley’s dissatisfaction, Joy slowly walked herself closer, bringing Riley’s hand down, as everything lowered and returned to normal. “Please, trust me. Once you’re safe, we’ll do whatever it takes to fight this.”

Riley took a deep breath, and slowly let it out. Then she got a pensive look, staring at the core memory sitting on the ground. “What if….what if we used THIS memory to create a counter belief?”

Joy also looked down at the memory, but pressed her lips together. “I…but this is YOUR special memory Riley. You created it on our first night seeing each other face to face. It’s what helps you to trust us. It creates a part of your personality. If you leave it down here…I don’t know if you’ll trust us again.”

Riley frowned. Staring intently at the image of herself making her way towards the control console. “ We’ll have the best day ev-aahh!” Riley slowly sat down. She rewound the memory again, then looked back up at Joy. “I look…so happy,” Riley quietly said. Joy gave a quiet nod, but pleaded with her eyes to not give up the orb. Riley set the memory down again, taking a deep breath. “Alright. We’ll keep it out for now.” She didn’t seem entirely convinced, but didn’t push things any further.

Joy looked around. “I hope we don’t wait too long. There are 4 other friends we’re supposed to meet here.”

Suddenly another splash came from the other side of the cavern, and swimming up from the other side was…

“Harry?!”

Harry slowly hauled himself onto the island. Drenched, and looking quite disheveled. Joy and Riley rushed over to him.

“Harry, are you okay? Where are Anger and Fear?”

Harry slowly looked up, seeing not Joy first but the other female. “Riley? You’re okay?”

Riley blinked. “Who are you?”

Harry looked over at Joy in exhausted confusion. Joy explained, “Riley’s lost her memories. I found her holding onto Possibility Island’s core, but she doesn’t remember anything inside or out.”

Harry slowly sat up, giving a sigh of discouragement. “Just my luck. I finally proved how brave and smart I am, and now Riley can’t appreciate it.” He then looked around, realizing someone else wasn’t with them. “Where’s Bing Bong Jr?”

Joy looked down in shame. “We were separated after swimming into the Stream of Consciousness. I barely managed to find Riley. I haven’t seen Jr anywhere.”

Riley suddenly gasped. The other two turned to look at her, and she looked surprised. “I..I remember Bing Bong. He…saved me, right?”

Joy gave a small, but hopeful nod. “He disappeared to make sure you could be happy again. But…you accidentally created a new one. He asked to be called Jr since he knew he wasn’t the original.”

Riley stared for a moment, then her eyes began to focus. “We have to find him. If I remembered Bing Bong, maybe he can help me reconnect to other memories I have.”

Harry held up a hand. “Whoa, hold on. The Unconscious is HUGE. We have to save Anger and Fear first.”

“Wait, what??” Joy asked.

Harry looked at the other two, a sad, serious look on his face, as he slowly got to his feet. “When we got through the subconscious, we found out there was a real troublemaker waiting for us at the divide. She’s called Paranoia, and she wanted to make you (he gestured to Riley) into a distrustful, overstressed person. We managed to get into the Unconscious without letting her out, but she grabbed Anger and Fear. I barely escaped.”

“Oh no.” Joy slowly stood up. A worried look on her face. “But…where are they now?”

“I don’t know. We have to figure out something.” Harry now looked at Riley still sitting. “If we don’t get them back, you’ll never be Angry or Scared again.”

Riley tilted her head. “Why does that matter?”

Joy then offered a hand, pulling Riley up. “They’re important emotions too. Fear helps keep you safe. And Anger helps you keep things fair with others.”

Riley blinked. “Huh. That’s something.” She then looked at Harry. “So…who are you in my mind?”

Harry gave a rueful smile. “Your imaginary boyfriend.”

Riley slowly began to smile hearing that. “You’re my imaginary boyfriend? And you managed to get to me through hardships and danger?” Riley almost gave a half laugh then hugged Harry. “My hero.”

Both Harry and Joy looked at each other in surprise, but then smiled. Harry in particular looked very proud. “I guess I did find a personality after all.”

Riley eventually pulled back. “So, what do we have to find everyone?”

Joy gestured back to the two orbs sitting on the island. “All Riley and I have with us are 2 memories. What about you Harry?”

Harry reached for his belt. “Fear gave me the key between the subconscious and unconscious and-”

“A walkie!”

Harry held up the walkie. “Yeah. A walkie.” Then he blinked. “OH! A walkie. We can call for help!”

Joy held out a hand. “More than that. We can call for information. We’ll reach out to Sadness, and she’ll know how to find Paranoia.”

Harry almost handed over the radio, but then stopped for a second. “One small problem: Sadness isn’t near the mind manuals right now. Ennui is.”

“That still works.” Joy took the walkie, quickly adjusted the channel and started speaking into it. “This is Joy, calling from the Belief System. Does anyone read me, over?”

A crackle came in. “ This is Disgust. You’re on the wrong channel Joy. Envy and I are working to get a new console ready, so I can’t help you with the Unconscious right now.”

“Do you know what channel Ennui is on?”

“ Try channel 5.”

“Everything okay up there? Do you have an exit plan for us yet?”

“ Not yet. Envy and I are still trying to reach the Pituitary Assembly. We’ll work something out as soon as we get back to Ennui.”

“Thanks Disgust. Do whatever you can. We’ll need your help soon enough.” Joy then tuned the walkie to channel 5. “En-wa, you there?”

“ That’s not my name Joy!”

Joy puckered her lips briefly. “On-wer? Is that right?”

“Ennui. Aan-Wee! You’re embarrassing yourself, Joy.”

Joy now sighed in exasperation. “Can you cut me a little slack? I only just got this radio.”

“Oh? Have you reunited with Bing Bong Jr.?”

“Uh, no? Listen, we’re using Fear’s radio right now. He and Anger got taken by one of the troublemakers down here. Is there any way we might be able to find them?”

“That’s not easy, Joy. The manuals on the unconscious aren’t exactly direct when talking about it.”

“Well, I’m in the Belief System with Harry and Riley right now. We should be safe while you look.”

“.... You found Riley??? Mon ami, is she okay?”

Joy gave a sheepish laugh. “Mostly, but…well, something’s happened to her…”

There was a bit of silence on the other side, before Joy heard Ennui give a guttural groan. “ Oh Noooo! She’s been unconscious for too long already?? She already lost her memories?!?” This was followed by a string of muttered words that Joy couldn’t make out. “ This will take a few minutes to give you anything to work with. Although, have you tried calling ANGER’S radio yet?”

Harry cut in on the radio. “We can’t use that radio yet.” He then looked at the hole he came through. “If they haven’t taken it from him, then it’s our secret weapon. If they have, then we’ll be in trouble before long.”

Ennui sighed through the walkie. “ Une minute. I’ll see what I can do.”

The three travelers also sighed, and took a seat. No matter what the plan would be, they’d need a minute to rest and figure out what to do next.

Anger did everything possible to keep squirming. Not just because he couldn’t stand feeling powerless, but because he didn’t want Paranoia to notice the walkie he had in his back pocket. He hoped his rambunctiousness would be good for disguising that for the right moment. As they moved through the unconscious, he and Fear noticed how despite the darkness, the Unconscious actually was pretty beautiful. With stars, flying memory orbs, and some unique sounds as they were carried along.

Finally, they reached a shining city. The sign at the entrance read “Egopolis: It’s the City All About ME”. Looking at the sign, Fear looked over at Anger, asking, “Who’s the ME mentioned in this place?”

It wasn’t Anger who answered, but Paranoia as they began to slink through the roads of Egopolis. “The ORIGINAL “troublemaker” created this city. Apparently, she was cast down after Riley first began understanding what sharing was. But she’s always tried to reach out ever since. Insistent that Riley’s making her life “too complicated”. And lately, she’s brought all four of us together to finally get out.”

Anger bristled. “Four?”

They then came to an enormous building which Paranoia strolled into. In the center was a table. And sitting at the table were 3 enormous beings.

“Paranoia? You…you found people from upstairs…too?”

This came from a grey being. One with long hair, and a dingy grey outfit. But in its hands was a squirming pink elephant made of cotton candy.

“JR!?”

Bing Bong Jr turned towards Fear’s declaration. “Fear! Anger! It’s so good to see you two!” Then he squirmed again. “Loneliness, can you put me down so I can hug them?”

Loneliness shook its head. “Not yet.”

Paranoia rolled her eyes. “Yes Loneliness. But unlike you, these two will actually be useful for getting out.”

The other two large beings started intently at Fear and Anger. And despite himself, Anger felt that same unease when Paranoia first revealed herself. One of the beings was a dark, almost black shade of red. He was carrying a sword, but was dressed like a gangster. With a slick looking hat, and red eyes that didn’t seem all too different from Paranoias. His suit was black, and he had a vicious smile on his face looking straight at Anger. The other one was pearl white. But instead of being shiny, all the light seemed to stop cold over this being’s body as if it was stopping all the light rather than reflecting it. She was dressed like a queen, but her regality looked cheap and plastic. However, her crown proudly proclaimed in large letters I AM NARCISSISM!

The crowned one had a dissonantly calm voice as she spoke. “Paranoia, you truly brought me a wonderful gift. ” However, then she reached across and batted Paranoia in the face. “ Consider that a mercy for trying to leave without ME! ”

Paranoia recoiled, but bowed her head. “Apologies…Narcissism. I forgot how much we work together.”

The other emotion then leaned in. “Why, Anger! I didn’t know I was going to meet my daddy today!”

Anger rolled his eyes in response. “Why does every troublemaker here always call me their dad? Just who are you anyways?”

In response, the gangster reached over, taking Anger from Paranoia, and began lightly squeezing his head. “Don’t talk down to ME you little man. I’m Spite! And I could crush you like a bug on the sidewalk right now!” Anger felt slightly alarmed as he realized Spite was right. He could feel himself getting squished slightly. But, then he was placed down on the table. “However, it’ll be more fun to keep you locked up while I take over your job. Then Riley won’t just be mad at others. She’ll pay them back tenfold for every wrong thing they do to her! And you’ll be sitting powerless while I do it! You’d HATE that, won’t you?”

Anger fumed at the grinning Spite. “You…what I do for Riley is all about being Fair! I don’t go around body checking other hockey players or being mean to our teachers, or-” Anger suddenly froze. “Did…did YOU bring out the worst in Riley this week?”

Spite scoffed. “ Please, goomba. You give me too much credit. Sure, little Riley’s done plenty of lashing out lately, but being here means the Unconscious keeps me from directly adding input.” Then Spite growled. “ Honestly, I’m amazed by her self control with Tracy. If I was up there, I’d have punched out Tracy’s teeth the first day!” Anger blinked in shock and horror.

Narcissism gave a deep sigh. “ Yes. It is unfortunate that we don’t get to run things. But, now that I have all three of you, we can take over once Riley wakes up again. Because of course she will. After all, I’m me. And I will never die!” Narcissism then looked at the three other large troublemakers around the table. “Place ‘Jr’ in my playroom for now. I’ll come see him in a bit. And as for ‘dear’ Fear and Anger, throw them into my dungeon IMMEDIATELY!”

As each of the other large emotions lead the three prisoners away, Fear, Bing Bong Jr and Anger all struggled to get out. But it was no use, as the two emotions were taken down a flight of stairs. Jr. gulped in concern, but looked up at Loneliness. “Please. Let me go. I could easily make sure Riley isn’t lonely anymore. You don’t have to do anything else to me.”

Loneliness glanced down at Jr, moving sideways through the building while climbing higher. “I’m sorry….Bing Bong….but nobody goes against…Narcissism.”

Jr squirmed a little more, but tried to place his hands on Loneliness. “And why is that?”

Loneliness shuddered. “She’s…terrifying. And….it’s easy to understand her. She makes me…big.”

Jr. bit his lip. This was going all wrong. Before long, he couldn’t help himself. He felt little pieces of candy start trickling out of his eyes. Landing behind them as they made their way to ‘the playroom’.

Sadness continued to look down different corridors, but there wasn’t a soul in sight. She was getting quite frustrated after all this, until she stumbled upon a slightly open vault door, where a shadowy figure tentatively peaked out.

“Who's there?”

Sadness approached the door. “Who’s there?” she also asked.

The vault moved slightly, and an enormous, black, hooded figure peaked out, with glowing white eyes and teeth.

“Sadness?”

Sadness took a step back. She wasn’t sure what Riley had in this vault. “You know me?”

The figure gave a grim frown. “Everyone knows emotions.” It pointed at itself. “I’m Deep Dark Secret.” It then pointed right at Sadness. “YOU ALL are Riley’s Darkest Secret! You’re MUCH worse than burning that hole in rug!”

Sadness shrunk back slightly. “Is that bad?” The Secret frowned, but shrugged. Sadness sniffed. “So, you aren’t Riley wanting to stay here forever?”

Deep Dark Secret cringed. “Not anymore. Not after last night.”

Sadness looked down. “Sorry. Maybe if we made her more comfortable on the outside, she wouldn’t have put that on you.” Sadness then looked up sadly. “Do…do you know anything about a manual coming here in the last few hours?”

Deep Dark Secret raised an eyebrow. “Manual?”

Sadness uneasily nodded. “Yeah. It…might’ve been dropped off earlier?”

He frowned, but then pointed off down the hallway. “Follow to the end, then turn Left. There’s always someone at the front.”

Sadness nodded. “Thank you. This vault is a maze.” She was about to head out, but looked at Deep Dark Secret still standing there. “When do you think is the right time for you to come out?”

Deep Dark Secret shrugged again. “Never?” Then it started to close the vault door. “Who would believe her?” And the vault closed with a thud.

With that ominous send off, Sadness started moving forward, back in her own head. “Oh Riley, what a mess we made together. How do we get out of this?”

Paranoia and Spite threw Anger and Fear into a small jail cell. Which was actually the size of the smaller rather than the larger emotions.

Anger looked defiantly up at the two. “You won’t keep us here! The other emotions will come for us!”

Paranoia chuckled. “Oh I’m counting on it.”

Spite then leaned down. “And once they do, I’ll make sure I actually catch Riley this time.”

Fear sat up on hearing that. “This time?”

Spite snickered, but didn’t elaborate. “ We’ll be sure to bring in some TV later. Once we’re ready to replace you two. ” Then their captors stomped away, though Anger and Fear could tell they were deep in discussion as they left.

Once everything was still again, Anger immediately approached the bars. And started hammering on them.

CLANG!

He pulled at them. He flamed at them. But no matter what, nothing could bend or break them.

Fear also approached, looking the bars over. Then, gave an exasperated sigh. “Anger, these are titanium bars. You can’t bend or melt titanium with fire or fists.”

Anger wielded around. “Well I don’t see you trying anything, genius!”

Fear walked over to one of the beds. Sitting down, crossing his arms, looking exhausted and frustrated. “This was…a real hard journey to even get here. Why don’t we just…rest for now?” Anger opened his mouth, but Fear cut him off. “It’s not like we can do anything else.”

Anger huffed, but had to admit Fear was right. At least at the moment. “It’s too bad we had to leave your emergency kit in the Subconscious.”

Fear glanced out of the bars, seeing a few odd skeletons in some of the other cells. “I…don’t think there was any prison break gear in my pack.” Fear then looked down, mumbling something to himself.

Anger glanced at Fear. “What was that?”

Fear looked back up. He once again had the hollow eyed look from when Paranoia went off on them. “Even if we did have something to help, haven’t we done enough for Riley?”

Anger raised an eyebrow. “What?”

Fear sat up a little straighter. “YOU broke the intercom. I accidentally let her hear us the next day. And ever since, it’s been a parade of bad choices and unlucky breaks for us! Maybe…maybe this is what we deserve for a little.”

Anger stomped towards Fear, tension in every step. “All the bad breaks are EXACTLY why we can’t stop now. We have to fix Riley! And as long as we’re in here, we can’t do that!”

Fear looked past the other emotion, his frown deepening. “I still want to find Riley, but look at everything we’ve run into on the way down. It feels like we’re condemned every step of the way for all that happened this last week. What if Paranoia’s right? What if this IS our fault?”

Anger promptly grabbed Fear by the throat, dragging him down to his level. He hissed, “We don’t make that kind of talk! We did exactly what we did before, so it’s not like we changed what was going on at all this last week.” Then he tossed him back onto the bed, a look of disdain on his face. “But, what should I expect from the weakest emotion Riley’s ever had?”

Fear looked up, a shocked look turning to simmering anger himself. “Excuse me?”

Anger pointed a finger at Fear. “You heard me! All you’ve ever given us is dodges to our problems, and I should’ve expected a dork like you to give up on our girl when she needs us the most!”

Fear threw up his hands. “I’m not giving up on her! Oh my God, we’re doing this now?”

Anger pounded his hands. It was finally time. None of the other emotions could stop him from giving Fear the piece of his mind he’d been holding onto all these years. “Sure. We have time since we’re prisoners now! Nothing about you ever made sense to me!”

Fear jumped down to the floor. And for the first time in his life, he was angry right back at Anger. “Well same to you! You’ve been trying to push me around ever since we met! You reckless blockhead! Why can’t you be more careful!?”

Anger replied right back. “Why can’t you be more decisive?”

“I’m plenty decisive! That’s why I’m in charge of reflexes during Hockey! And I was out there saving Riley from electrical cords LONG before you EVER came upstairs!”

“I’m not talking about our baby years anymore. I’m talking about how you blew it when Tracy got on us at Pizza Planet!”

Fear didn’t back down. All his pent up resentment and frustration continued to roll over him. “What would you have done? Hit her?! We’d get in worse trouble than ever if that happened!”

Anger didn’t back down either. “Tracy called Riley crazy! And she kept doing it OVER and OVER! If Riley shut her up the first time, Tracy could’ve stopped before it kept getting worse and worse!”

Fear shook his head. “If we hit Tracy, we’d be proving her right about us. See, it’s this kind of egging Riley on which helped create Isolation Island. You blamed her for the thoughts she was having, and now she thinks she can’t trust anyone!”

“She had to take accountability for what she was doing!”

“By making her think she hated her life and it was all her fault?!”

Anger bit his lip at that accusation. “That’s…not what I wanted.” Fear raised an eyebrow at Anger’s deflection, but Anger went right back to it. “Hey! I’m not the only one who made Riley miserable! How about when you told her that she’d always be alone with us!?”

Fear briefly became confused. “What are you talking about?”

Anger paused for a second. Fear raised his other eyebrow. This DEFINITELY wasn’t like Anger. As an emotion of extremes, him actually taking a minute to think about his words was unusual to say the least. Anger then took a deep breath, and looked Fear in the eyes. “Remember when we were walking home on Monday? And you talked about the dangers of people learning about us?”

“So?”

Anger took a step forward. He no longer looked nearly as angry, but now seemed serious in a different way. “When you said that, you made Riley think she can’t share this with ANYONE!”

“She can’t! It’s hard enough when it’s just us. We can’t be responsible for hurting someone else!”

“So she’ll go through life like this Forever Alone? Always hiding a part of herself on the inside? That’s not fair to Riley! ”

“It’s the safest way for Riley to have a life into the future.” Fear then crossed his arms. “I thought you agreed with me. You’re the one who wanted to call up the mind workers to fix the intercom.”

Anger snorted, but shrugged. “We were locked out. Joy was gone. We’d lost four core memories. We needed something to help Riley which wasn’t just waiting for the night.” Then Anger sat down on the ground, seeming burnt out. “But the Intercom wasn’t fixed. We don’t know if it’ll ever be fixed even if we get a new headquarters. If Riley’s always going to hear us, but never be honest with others, why do we bother with Honesty Island? You did want to keep that island going, but if Riley lives her life with a lie at its center, why should that be a core memory?”

Fear now frowned in confusion. He racked his mind for an answer, but had nothing to say.

Anger looked over. “That’s what I thought.”

Fear now sighed, taking a seat next to Anger on the ground. “Look, I’m not saying honesty and safety can’t go together. I’m just saying that…Riley’s special. Not everyone would take other versions of us well.”

Anger then said with surprising quiet, “How can we know if we’ve never really tried? Riley only ever told part of the truth. Maybe it’s finally time to face everyone with full honesty.”

Fear jolted in shock. “Wait, wait, wait. Are you saying Riley should…tell the truth about us?”

Anger looked down. “I don’t know if we have any other choice. Riley can’t keep doing this to herself. And since the Intercom was broken when Headquarters collapsed, we have no idea how things will be once we get it back. It might be gone, fixed, or still broken. And no matter which it is, I don’t think Riley could ever go back to pretending like we aren’t real. She can’t help but let her real feelings out. And with all her soul memories, she’d never forget us either.”

Fear shook his head rapidly. “It’s just so…drastic!”

Anger then cracked a small, ironic smile. “Maybe. But what if someone does believe? Maybe the only way forward would be to think like Joy and hope for the best.”

Fear looked over in surprise. But seeing Anger’s smile, he gave a light laugh of his own. “I guess Joy rubbed off on both of us.” Anger chuckled at that. Fear looked down after that. “I’ll…I’ll think about it. But, we’ll have to talk about this with Riley. Maybe after all this, Riley would prefer to forget all about us instead.”

Anger wrinkled his forehead, but nodded. “Fair enough.” Then he looked back at the bars. “Well, now I guess we need a minute to figure out how to escape.”

“ Anger? Anger, are you here? ”

Fear looked down at Anger’s pocket. “You had another walkie?”

Anger slowly began to smile. “I didn’t give mine up like the others.” Then he reached back, pulling it out, trying to speak softly. “Harry? Is that you?”

“Ssssshhh!” came Harry’s voice. “Yes, it’s me. And it’s good to hear you still have this. But listen-” Harry’s voice cut off briefly. “-coming for you now. Do you have any idea where you are?”

Anger glanced around. “We’re in some kind of jail in Egopolis if you can find that.”

“Okay. Then hold tight. As soon as we find you, we’ll get you out of there.”

Anger raised an eyebrow looking at their walkie. “Who’s we?”

Chapter Text

Chapter 12: Positive Thinking

Sadness hurried down the hall. After reaching the end, she could finally see the gates of the front door to her left at last. Just like Dark Secret said. As she came out of the hallway, she also finally saw some mind police. One taller and teal, the other shorter and blue.

“And you’re sure the other secrets are secure?”

“We’ve got most of the other staff patrolling the halls. If anything tries to get out, we’ll be there.”

“Why don’t we just open the Vault up? If we don’t know whether Riley’s going to make it, maybe it’s better to have no more secrets.”

“That’s not our call, Johnson. Until we hear from Headquarters or central nervous command, we’re keeping this place on lockdown.”

Sadness got within twenty feet of the two officers, before shyly saying, “Excuse me?”

The two jumped, and immediately started moving towards Sadness. “An escapee! Get her!”

Sadness began backing up, shocked at this sudden turn. “Wait, wait. I’m Sadness! I’m from Headquarters!” And just before they reached her, she shouted, “I’m leading Protocol 1999!”

Both stopped in their tracks. The taller one asked, “How do YOU know about Protocol 1999?”

Sadness rebraced herself. “I told you. I’m Sadness. And I’m calling for Protocol 1999!”

The two officers looked at each other, then came to attention, their posture now stiff and formal. “Then The Vault is at your command!” declared the shorter one.

Sadness couldn’t help but grimace. This kind of authority she really wasn’t used to having after 11 years of being pushed aside by Joy. Still, she tried to hold herself up. “No need for that…Johnson,” she said, remembering one of their names. “I just need to know if you all picked up anything when Headquarters collapsed.”

The two relaxed a little. Johnson stepped up to talk. “Well, when Headquarters collapsed, we went into lockdown pretty quickly. But, maybe there is something we might’ve brought in at the last second.” He pointed to a pile of things near the other hallway over. “In our rush, we threw any last minute secrets in that pile as long as they weren’t living memories.”

Sadness hurried over, looking at piles of orbs, sticks, and other assorted items. “You picked up this much?”

“We didn’t want to slack even when we lost contact with you.”

Sadness began scanning the pile, looking for anything that looked like a book or manual. Until, she spotted the corner of something poking out on the far side. She gave a small gasp. “Is that…” She began moving things aside, displacing the orbs as she got closer. Eventually, as she pulled away a grey looking orb, she finally saw a white cover. And with slight trepidation, she reached for it, pulling it close. And on the cover were the words Advanced Console Operations .

Sadness sighed in relief. “Found it.” She turned back to the police who were looking over her shoulder. “We need this manual to save Riley. Please open the main doors. I need to get back to the other emotions.”

The tall officer looked down with a little unease, but shrugged. “Alright. Since you’re already here, we might as well.” As he reached for a lever by the main doors, he quickly looked back. “Do you still want The Vault in lockdown?”

Sadness pondered for a minute. Before looking at the two officers with unease. “Go to normal security again. If any of the secrets are lost during all this, then they aren’t worth keeping.”

Johnson raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything at first. “Alright. Let’s get you out of here.” He and the other guard pulled down two levers at once. The gate made a small hiss, and swung open. “We’ll send a few officers to help outside here thanks to Protocol 1999. Good luck, Sadness.”

Sadness looked between the two of them, but gave a small smile. “Thank you. We’ll do our best.” Then she hurried out the door. Her journey was complete, and thankfully, successful.

“...And that’s all I can say about the Unconscious.”

Joy sighed. “Thanks…can I just call you wee-wee to make this easier?”

“.....Non.”

“Uhgh, okay. Is it Ahn----Wee?”

“.....Better.”

Joy turned off the walkie, again looking at both Harry and Riley. Both looked just as tired as she felt. Ennui gave them a lot of information, but it wasn’t presented straightforwardly. Stuff about anchor points, typical landmarks, and expected troublemakers. It was mostly speculation without knowing anything for sure.

“I don’t even know if that was helpful,” Joy grumbled.

“Well, I guess we’ll need to call Anger to get a more clear direction,” Harry sighed. He reached for the walkie, and changed the channel. “Here goes. Anger? Anger, are you there?”

The space was quiet for a moment. And then, “ Harry? Is that you?”

In shock, Harry almost dropped the walkie, before quickly shushing into it. Then whispering, “Yes, it’s me. And it’s good to hear you still have this. But listen, I found Joy and Riley. We’re coming for you now. Do you have any idea where you are?”

“ We’re in some kind of jail in Egopolis if you can find that.”

Joy whispered next to Harry, “We’re right next to Egopolis. It’s right near the belief system AND the forest of hidden influences.”

Harry looked over at Joy. Whispering back, “Really? I came in from a different direction, so I wouldn’t know!” He quickly turned back to the walkie which he hadn’t pushed the button on for that moment. “Okay. Then hold tight. As soon as we find you, we’ll get you out of there.”

“Who’s we?”

Harry nervously looked at Joy and Riley, before shaking his head. “You didn’t hear me?”

“ Must…cut out.”

“Anger? Are you okay there?”

“ I guess the signal’s a little bad down here.”

“Then let’s keep it quiet since I don’t know where Paranoia is right now.”

“Now you sound paranoid!”

“Listen, we’ll come get you as soon as we can. Trust me on that. Over.”

There was a light grumble from the other side, but then they heard Fear speak. “Please hurry! I don’t know how much longer Riley’s mind………………Headquarters! The manuals say….!” And the line went dead again.

Joy and Harry looked at each other, and both nodded. “Follow me,” declared Joy. She then pointed towards a different entrance, and began moving over.

Riley began to follow them. “Wait up,” she called.

Joy and Harry looked at each other, then at Riley, and Joy spoke with reluctance. “Riley, maybe it’s best if you just stay here.”

Riley frowned in annoyance. “But, there’s nothing in here for me to do! Not unless I start taking orbs from the water or keep listening to myself over and over.”

Harry then spoke. “There are troublemakers down here who want nothing more than to get out. And from what I’ve seen, they don’t care about subtlety or friends or allowing any other emotions. What happens if they get their hands on you as you are now?”

Riley shook her head. “I’m still not sure if I believe I’m who you say I am yet. I won’t be left behind until I feel safe by myself. And I don’t feel safe or happy here!”

One of the grey threads unexpectedly snapped after that declaration. Joy cringed, and then watched a memory orb float away towards a dark patch in the cavern where it disappeared from sight. A couple rocks also fell down into the lake. Joy swallowed, and turned to their girl, who was standing with a mixture of fear and defiance on her face. “Alright. It’s probably better not to leave you alone here anyways since you just conscious tampered without trying.” Riley blinked in surprise, but Joy held out a hand. “But you stick as close to me as possible until we’re out of The Unconscious.”

Riley still looked a little disgruntled, but retook Joy’s hand. “What about the other orbs?” She nodded back to the core memory and soul memory still on the ground.

“We’ll leave them here for now. They’d be too cumbersome to always carry. I should know.” Joy chuckled to herself thinking about the brief time she spent carrying all 5 memory orbs around long term last year. And so, the three of them made their way back to the exit holes.

Daintily stepping off of the tarp across the memory dump, Disgust let out an exhausted sigh. “Finally! That thing is gross to walk on!”

Envy then hopped off after her, shaking out her legs that were now unused to solid ground. “Well, at least until we go back.”

Disgust gagged in distaste. “Those mind workers better have a car or something,” she grumbled. Then she took stock of where they were. Since the front side of the mind usually wasn’t visible from Headquarters, Disgust didn’t recognize any of the spaces by instinct. “Sadness said the assembly was between 3rd deja vu and…where again?”

Envy looked ahead, then frowned in distaste. “I don’t exactly remember, but none of these spaces look very fun.”

Disgust looked at the 3 large structures in front of them. One looked quite familiar, almost like a copy of another building she noticed on the walk over. Perhaps even a 3rd copy. One had several police officers surrounding it. And finally, there was a building right in the middle which looked like a factory.

Disgust deadpanned, “Hmm, if I had to guess, the Pituitary Assembly is in the factory.” She then looked down at the little emotion again. “Stay close to me, and I’ll do all the talking.” And the two of them made their way towards the factory building.

Envy though did have one question. “Why do you get to do all the talking?”

“Because I’ve actually talked with mind workers before. Do you want to try and get them to make a new console?”

Envy gave a shy smile. “Maybe?”

Disgust groaned. “Just..trust me for now.”

Envy pondered for a second, before shrugging. “Alright. You’re the leader.”

Walking up to the front doors, the factory was big, but shaped like a large sphere. It was also painted blue and yellow, with a giant gate around it. There was a sign that declared what this space was, but the sign looked a little worse for wear right now. And although there were lights in some of the windows, not every window was lit.

Moseying through the gate, Disgust also noticed a calendar near the entrance. There was a lot of writing, and the calendar was in years rather than months. There were scribbles on different pages with notes like, “first teeth”, “first growth spurt”, and a little further down, “first bleeding?”

Disgust immediately jumped back, holding her mouth looking at the calendar. Envy, coming up behind her now looked with concern, before looking at the calendar herself. “Um, what’s ‘first bleeding’?”

Disgust couldn’t stop herself this time. She vomited up a small green patch on the ground. Gasping for air afterwards, she took a deep breath, and looked at Envy in exhaustion and with an ill look on her face. “It’s gross is what it is! And I’m NOT going to talk about it right now!”

Envy tilted her head. This wasn’t Disgust’s self loathing, but she truly looked her emotion right now. “That bad?” Disgust gave a weak nod, then hurried into the main factory floor, saying nothing more.

The mind workers in here didn’t seem as active compared to the rest of the mind. In fact, there were several of them sitting on an inactive machine who looked down as Disgust stepped onto the grated area of the floor.

“Well, hello there ma'am," one purple mind worker said with a rough charm. Getting up, he asked, “What can we do for you today?”

Disgust rolled her eyes. “First off, you’re too short for me. Second, where’s your manager? We have something to discuss.”

The worker pointed up to an office several floors higher in the sphere. “You’ll want to go talk with Steve. He’s in charge of day to day operations.”

With a nod of thanks, Disgust and Envy moved over to the elevator. Though as it opened up, Disgust grumbled as she was only just short enough to get in without needing to crouch. “Stupid mind worker sized stuff,” she snorted as they went up.

Reaching the office, Envy reached the doorknob, and swung open the door to a big office. While it was more spacious than the floor below, there was still a lot of clutter in papers, doughnuts and office supplies all around. Sitting at the big desk in the middle was a mind worker wearing a baseball hat, and glasses. Who sat up seeing someone come into the office.

“Oh. Emotions? Come in, come in.” The two emotions entered the office space, looking at Steve with a touch of skepticism given how unassuming he looked. “So, can I have your names?”

Disgust snorted. “What, you don’t recognize me?”

The worker snickered. “It’s for the records. We keep things very tight around here. So any sudden changes need to be kept track of.” He pulled out a pen and paper, looking up expectantly.

Disgust sighed, but played along. “I’m Disgust. This is Envy. And we need your team’s help.”

Steve’s eyes widened slightly, but kept writing as he talked. “Our help? But our work here usually doesn’t need direction. We have strict schedules to keep to, and anything extra might make things…weird for Riley in the future.”

Disgust snorted. “Well, things were weird for Riley last week, so it wouldn’t be anything new.”

Steve bit his lip briefly, but went back to the paper. “What do you need help with?” Disgust opened her mouth, but Steve suddenly interrupted her. “Wait, don’t tell me. You want us to build a new Headquarters, right?”

“Not exactly,” Disgust said.

As if he didn’t hear her, Steve kept going. “I’m just saying, we’d be flying blind for that since we weren’t responsible for creating the baseline look of the building. It could take weeks, or even years to make.”

“We need to reestablish it for sure, but that’s not why we’re here,” Disgust insisted. “We need your team’s help to create a new Console.”

Steve paused in his scribbling. “A…new console?”

Disgust sighed. “The old one shorted out before the collapse. And the manual on special emergencies calls for a new one to bring things back to normal.” Disgust then gave a half smirk. “It’s all part of protocol 1999.”

Steve then stared up at Disgust in shock. “Protocol…1999!!??”

Disgust nodded. “Yes. That one.”

Steve then hurried over to a drawer, pulling out a manual, and flipping it open, scanning the pages. “Protocol 1453, Protocol 1789, Protocol 1842, Protocol 1978, Ah, here it is.” He then scanned over the words, before quickly looking back up at Disgust. “That bad, huh?” Disgust gave a nod. Steve then took off his glasses, polished them and put them back on his head. “Normally, building a new console isn’t possible. There’s all kinds of wiring and programming we’re supposed to connect to the main Headquarters whenever we upgrade the console.”

Disgust became uneasy hearing that. “But..the manuals said this is essential to a special emergency because of consciousness tampering.”

Steve then pulled out another manual, flipping to another page. “Like I said, that’s normally how it goes.” Then he pointed at a new image on the other manual with a few things written on the side. “However, we do actually have a reserve material depot we can use to create what you’re looking for.” Seeing their hopeful faces, he raised a hand, before pointing to a note on the page. “It still won’t function without something to spark it, and if we do that, we’re probably going to delay Puberty for a little. That requires some special tools, and we’ll need to rebuild the reserves to make sure Riley isn’t stunted later in life.”

Disgust leaned in, hands falling onto the table. “Whatever it takes. If we don’t get this fixed up, there won’t be puberty.”

Steve met her eyes, nodded solemnly, and finished scribbling a few notes. “Alright. We’ll get going immediately. I assume you’ll have Advanced Console Operations on hand in case we need to make any special modifications?”

Disgust and Envy both looked at each other for a minute. But Envy was the one who stepped up first. “I think so. The other emotions were just finishing sorting the last time we checked in on them. So I’m sure they’ll have it.”

Steve then pressed a button on an intercom resting on his desk. “Alright you bums! Protocol 1999 is active, subclause CT. I need squads D, R and T to open up the reserves so we can make a new console for Headquarters. Get going, and prepare the emergency train for action. We’re taking the fast lane across the dump today.” A few clatters were heard down below, before Steve looked at the two ladies. “I assume you both want a lift back across?”

“Yes Please!” both immediately said.

Steve then handed them some paper badges. “Show these to the conductor, and we’ll get you both across with us.”

With a nod of thanks, the 2 emotions walked out. Disgust gave a sigh of relief. “Finally. Looks like we finished our job.”

Envy hugged Disgust’s leg. “So I did good coming with you?”

Disgust again had an annoyed look on her face, but it was only half serious. She pulled Envy back up to her level. “Only so far as you didn’t mess anything up. But...I am glad you came with me. It made the journey much less boring.” Envy gave a toothy smile, and Disgust hurried to the elevator. “Now come on. Let’s get back to Ennui and Sadness.”

Sadness moved as fast as she could, manual in hand. Thankfully, now that she’d traveled to The Vault, getting back felt much faster. Quickly returning to where all the mind manuals were organized, she saw Ennui still chilling on her phone. But Sadness also saw Embarrassment sitting off to the side quietly picking up some of the debris that the Train of Thought spilled out.

Ennui gave a small glance to her side and simply asked, “Found it?” Seeing Sadness raise the book up, Ennui gave a disinterested sigh, and looked back at her phone. Doing something or other.

Embarrassment meanwhile came softly up to Sadness, a small smile of hope on his face. But then Sadness noticed what was in his hands. “A Core memory?” Embarrassment nodded vigorously, and pointed behind himself. Sadness gave a small gasp. The bag Fear put most of the cores in was lying on its side and there was a gaping hole from where it hit the ground on impact. “We didn’t even think about keeping track of the cores!” sadness moaned. She then looked back to Embarrassment. “How many do we still have?” Embarrassment then gestured to the side. Sadness quickly hurried to where several of the orbs were next to each other. Embarrassment also placed the one he was holding next to them.

She brushed through them all, mumbling to herself as she tried to take stock of what was there. “Honesty, Goofball, Boy Band, Fashion, Tragic Vampire Romance…” Then Sadness’s eyes widened. “Wait…we’re missing some.” She looked around, and turned to Embarrassment. “Where are Hockey, Friendship, Family and Possibility??”

Embarrassment immediately grimaced in hurt. But then hurried over in the other direction to see if he could locate them. As Sadness also desperately looked for the missing orbs in the area, Sadness then noticed how despite what Dream Productions was doing, the Memory Dump was still slowly getting bigger. In fact, the cliff looked much closer compared to the start of the crisis. “Ohhh….I hope they didn’t-”

“Hey, you two?” Sadness’s line of thought abruptly cut off hearing Ennui speak up again. She and Embarrassment both stopped what they were doing, and looked over to the Indigo Emotion dragging herself up onto her socks. “I heard from the emotions in the Unconscious. I think we should start looking for exit plans now.”

Sadness perked up slightly. “Did…did they find Riley?”

Ennui gave a half serious nod. “Oui. But, the warning in Special Emergencies came true.” Sadness looked at that manual at Ennui’s feet, and coming over to it, leafed into the section on a Headquarters Collapse. She came to the note at the end, and looked back up in fear. Ennui preempted Sadness’s question with a nod and confirmation. “Oui, she’s cut off from her memories.”

Sadness then looked over at Advanced Console Operations right next to them. And her eyes narrowed. “We HAVE to get them out of there.” Looking at the two emotions, she pointed first to the ACO manual, then to the stacks that were still neatly organized. “Ennui, see if you can find anything in Advanced Console Operations that might help with making a new console or getting other emotions out of the Unconscious. Embarrassment, please help me look at the other manuals to find a way out of The Unconscious. It’s time we finally stabilize Riley so we can move on to step 4 through 6.”

Ennui opened her mouth to argue, but then closed it, seeing the angry eyes Sadness gave her to preempt her complaint. Ennui then picked up Advanced Console Operations, and laid back in her chair, now leafing through it for new instructions. Embarrassment by contrast immediately hurried to where the other manuals were resting, and started looking for ideas too.

“Do you think this’ll make things go back to normal?” Sadness looked up, seeing a grey, old looking emotion with rose tinted glasses and a big head of hair skittering towards them from Long Term.

Ennui briefly looked up with a semi-dismissive look. “What is normal, Nostalgia? We’re way past normal right now with Riley.”

“I mean, we don’t have to be. I’m sure there’s a way to make Riley forget all this.”

Sadness jerked up at this. “Riley would NEVER-”

Nostalgia, having reached them all, briefly shook Sadness’s cheek like she was her grandma. “Silly Sadness. Don’t you think things were better before this all started?” Before Sadness could say anything else, Nostalgia instead skittered over to the manuals too. “Anyways, I’m sure we can discuss it once Riley gets back here.” And she promptly picked up a manual to start reading.

Sadness blinked in confusion, but also began to think about what Nostalgia just said. Combined with what Deep Dark Secret mentioned, they both had a point. Them being a secret had made things complicated. Maybe it would be better if Riley forgot about them. Sighing to herself, Sadness made her way to the pile of manuals too. While she didn’t know if she agreed with Nostalgia, more than anything Sadness just wanted Riley to be okay. “We’ll save you Riley,” she mumbled to herself. “We’ll get you out of there before you know it.”

Joy, Harry and Riley made their way through the forest, but as they moved along, the area was becoming brighter. Joy bit her lip. “Well, we’re getting close.”

Riley held Joy’s hand a little tighter. “I…Joy, I…kinda remember being chased away from this place.”

“Chased?”

Riley closed her eyes, straining to remember. “There was this…really tall being. He was…black and red. And, he said that he was going to make sure I feel ‘Real’ emotions after he grabs me.”

Joy gave a nervous swallow. “Wait…oh. That must be what I heard while I was diving through your conscious thoughts.”

Riley squeezed Joy’s hand even harder. “Why is my mind so scary?”

Joy gave a sympathetic smile. “Only the darkest sections. There’s plenty of fun parts too. Those are the parts you liked the most this week.”

Harry gave Riley a light pat on the back. “And even here, we’re with you. You never have to go through this alone.”

Riley looked a little better, but still clutched onto Joy’s hand as they came to the edge of the Forest. They were right back on the edge of Egopolis. Looking in, the three travelers all covered their eyes with a hand to see through all the brightness.

“Why is it so bright?” mused Harry. “Seems like someone is trying too hard to stand out down here.”

Joy gave a chuckle. “Honestly, this is a bit much even for me.” Then she looked over at Harry. “This isn’t going to be easy. We know Fear and Anger are here, but which building are they in?”

Any answer Harry was going to give was cut off as they heard a shaking noise. The three travelers fell behind a bush, watching for whatever was coming. And coming out from behind one of the buildings were two huge beings. One a dark red looking gangster, and the other, like a disorderly looking Joy. Joy looked very confused seeing the twisted version of herself, but felt Riley immediately grabbing onto her, and Harry tensing up beside her. Joy then turned to look at them in confusion.

Riley pointed at the red one, and whispered, “It’s him. The chaser!” Joy quickly brushed a hand over Riley’s cheek, before then looking at Harry.

He murmured, “That’s Paranoia.” Joy gulped in concern, but then pushed aside a part of the bush to see what was going on.

“How come you get to search the forest while I’m on patrol of the city limits?”

“Because I’m better at striking out on my own. You, on the other hand, are great at obsessing about every little detail. This plays to our strengths.”

“But YOU were the one who didn’t catch Riley the first time! What makes you think you’ll do any better this time?”

Suddenly, Spite whirled around, grasping Paranoia by its dress. “Listen! I don’t have to play nice with you! I even expect you’re dying to find Riley so YOU’RE ‘primary emotion’ like Joy is right now.” Paranoia glared, but didn’t deny it. “The fact is, Narcissism is still mad at both of us. Me for losing Riley the first time, and you for trying to get out without her. So all we gotta do is play nice until we actually have our girl. Then we can fight over her all we want.”

Paranoia snorted. “For being a troublemaker, you sure are spineless SPITE!” That got Paranoia thrown into a building behind her. She dusted herself off, still giving Spite a death glare. “And you’re stupid. At least I was clever when I tried to get out. Just be glad we’re not near the Ivory Tower anymore. What if we lost the prisoners with your temper breaking that building?”

Spite spit in disgust. “Just make sure nobody gets past you until I get back. I’ll do a few sweeps of the forest, and then check if Hunger’s seen anything.” As he walked off, he swiped the tip of his sword at the top of a building, knocking some stone and dust into Paranoia’s face. “And don’t you disrespect me anymore.” Then he disappeared into a different part of The Forest.

Paranoia growled, but stalked off. “ I’m surrounded by idiots! ” she grumbled as she moved out of sight.

Joy let out a tiny breath, shrinking back into the hedge. Riley and Harry both looked terrified, but Joy pulled their hands together, with hers on top. “It doesn’t look like there’s too many things in Egopolis. All we gotta do is get into the city, and use our small size to get around without Paranoia noticing.”

“And where exactly are we going?” Harry whispered back.

“Paranoia mentioned something called The Ivory Tower where they keep prisoners. Let’s look there first.”

“How will we recognize it?”

Riley had secretly poked her head over the top of the push, and tapped Harry on the shoulder. “Uh, Harry? I think that won’t be too hard to find.”

Joy and Harry joined Riley, and looking over the city, saw her pointing at what looked like a white tower which was higher than all the other buildings in the area. So tall in fact, it seemed to stretch straight into the sky.

“Well, it’s a start,” Harry mused. “I’ll go first, and you two keep up behind me.”

Harry then crawled out from the bush, and began creeping and then jogging his way into the city. After a moment of hesitation, Joy took Riley’s hand, and the two of them began following after. Skittering on their way towards The Ivory Tower.

Bing Bong Jr. was unceremoniously dropped in an enormous playroom. He noticed a window nearby, and he looked pretty high up. So high, he could see the tops of other buildings in Egopolis. Jr looked around. The playroom did seem to resemble a fun looking playhouse. There was what looked like a large plastic castle in one corner. Some cars and planes. A few chests where toys poked out. What looked like a trap door in one corner. But on the other side of the room were some other supplies that seemed rather out of place in his mind. He turned back to Loneliness. “This place actually looks pretty fun. But, what are the scissors for?”

Loneliness sighed. “That’s for when Narcissism…wants to play with…the dolls.” It pointed to a shelf where there were various figures standing. Jr could see people, a few animals, and the other emotions all together on the shelf.

“So…she likes to change their outfits? Or fur?”

Loneliness gave a shake of its head. “Trust me, you better hope…she doesn’t make YOU…another doll.”

Jr felt the overwhelming nerves again straining all over himself. This was way too much for such a new imaginary being. He desperately tried to think of something to take his mind off of it all. “So…do you wanna play something right now?” He looked up at Loneliness, his eyes hopeful, but still nervous.

Loneliness looked a bit confused. “You…want to do something….with me?”

Jr nodded. “Sure. I’m an imaginary friend. I was made for fun with others.”

Loneliness shrunk at least 20 feet hearing that statement, but then tensed up. “Nobody….ever ASKS to play…with me. What would we….do? Narcissism doesn’t even…let me touch her toys…until she gets here.”

Jr. pondered for a moment, trying to think of a way to break through with this towering being. Then, an idea came to his head. “Wait. I have just the thing.” He unslung the bag that he’d been carrying around all this time. Reaching into it, he pulled out the headset from Dream Productions. “Let’s play flight captain! You can be the pilot, and we’ll fly together in our magic wagon.”

Loneliness shrunk again, now being only 10 feet tall. But again, it frowned. “Where would we fly?”

Jr. walked towards a large map laid out on one wall. It showed a map of Riley’s Mind. Interestingly, it showed both the upper and lower mind. Although Jr couldn’t exactly read what was on all of it, he pointed to the one recognizable place he’d always know. “We’ll be taking a trip to Imagination Land!” He turned, and this time he had a small smile. “My father was practically the mayor back in the day. And I’ll be sure to put a good word in for you.”

Loneliness put a hand under its chin, thinking. Then, shrunk to around Jr.’s size. “I…I don’t know if I’ll…be any good.”

Jr. gave a big grin. “Of course you’ll do good! You’re with me. And whatever we do, you’ll do great with me.” He rushed over, placing the headset on Loneliness’s head. “Captain, we’re ready for takeoff!”

Loneliness for a moment stood stock still. As if it didn’t know what to do. Then it looked at Jr, who nodded his head in anticipation. And for one of the few times in its life, Loneliness smiled. All the gloom that oozed off it abruptly stopped spreading. And Loneliness sat down on the ground, hands out in front. “Officer Jr, we’ll be on our way…in no time! Take your seat, it’s going….to be a rough ride!”

----------------------

Narcissism was making her way up the stairs, not even noticing the candy wrappers she was stepping on. She was thinking about how to use the captive emotions to escape. It was frustrating, because she had no idea how to get to the upper mind without the mind workers trying to cut her off immediately. “ Stupid Unconscious. Stupid gates. This is the perfect time to get out, but all the normal ways are blocked! Where is Harry?? I need that KEY! Hmm…what if I climbed up the Ivory Tower to that…other entrance point? Mmmm…but I still don’t have any way past the security gate.”

Any other thought was stopped as she heard laughing coming from her playroom. She immediately scowled at the thought of someone else having fun without her. And Narcissism began sprinting up the stairs. Bursting in, she found Loneliness and Jr riding in one of her cars, driving between different corners of the room, laughing to each other as they went.

“ HEY! GET AWAY FROM MY TOYS!”

Both the troublemaker and the imaginary being froze, the car abruptly coming to a stop. They turned to look at Narcissism, who stormed over, picking up the car in her hand. She plucked both of them from the seats, and tossed Loneliness towards the stairs.

“ Loneliness! You’re embarrassing me. We’re too big to play pretend anymore! And grow up! You’re supposed to be my size!” she shouted. Loneliness immediately looked abashed, and grew back to its bigger size. Surprisingly, the headset grew right along with it, so it now had an enormous one on its head.

This only made Narcissism even more mad. “And you got a gift?!? ” She glared down at Jr. “ Give me one good reason I shouldn’t toss you out the window right now! You’re being a Very Bad Toy!”

Jr desperately reached into his bag. “Wait, wait. I have something to give you too!” He felt around, and grasped something. He closed his eyes in fear. “ Please let this be the right thing. Please be the right thing,” he thought to himself as he began pulling one of the objects out of the bag. Opening his eyes, he sighed in relief. He’d grabbed the right thing. Then, he held it up for her to see. “See? Now you can let everyone hear you whenever you want!” Narcissism narrowed her eyes at the object in Jr’s hands. “It’ll be great!”

Reaching down, Narcissism plucked the object from his hands. She gave it a few tugs to make it bigger. Then, she walked over to one of the windows. Holding the object up to her mouth, she shouted, “ Paranoia! Get up here now!”

For a moment, nobody heard anything. Then a voice echoed from down below. “ Fine. I’m coming.” And then, in annoyance, “ Where did you get a bullhorn anyways?”

Narcissism looked down at the little megaphone, but gave a tut of approval. “ Well, this is…acceptable I suppose. Thank you Jr.” Jr gave a nervous little nod. Not daring to say anything right away. Narcissism was scary. “Hmm…I think I know what we can play to make up for this…rough start.” Jr perked up for a moment. Then Narcissism gave a sinister smile. “ Let’s play Hide and Shriek!”

Loneliness immediately had a stricken face on hearing that. But as Jr’s back was to it, he instead hesitantly asked, “And…how do you play that?”

“Oh, it’s quite simple. You hide, and we’ll try to find you. But if we catch you, then I get to use the scissors on you.” Jr gave a slight glance back at Loneliness, who now looked panicked. And just before anything else could happen, Paranoia stalked up into the room. “Ah, Paranoia. Thank you for coming so fast. We’re playing Hide and Shriek with Jr!”

Paranoia looked over at Jr, now giving a fierce smile. “Finally. Some REAL fun down here!” she proclaimed. And Jr immediately got a panicked look on his face.

Narcissism then held out her queen’s rod, and slowly moved the two other troublemakers to the top of the stairs. She gave them both a stern look, and they closed their eyes. Narcissism placed Bing Bong Jr down on the ground, then proclaimed, “ We’ll count to….36. And when we finish, then the hunt begins! And no cheating by trying to run back downstairs! 1, 2…”

Jr gave a tiny shriek. He looked around the room in fear, looking for a place to hide. Then, he noticed a castle on the far side of the room. One that was gathering dust. And he ran for it as fast as his legs could carry him. Hearing Narcissism count up all the while as he ran.

Joy peaked out from behind a nearby building. She’d watched as Paranoia made her way into what she presumed was The Ivory Tower. The building around it was huge and dark, but the towers in the middle were bright white. Quite the contrast. Joy looked to the left and right, but couldn’t see anyone or anything else on this empty street. She called back,  “Okay, I think we’re clear.”

She scurried across the road, with Harry and Riley coming up behind her gradually. Finally, after crossing the street, they’d reached the entrance to the buildings. They looked up. It was still a bit of a climb, as the steps were huge compared to what they’d experienced in the main parts of the mind.

Joy looked back at the two of them. “Give me a boost, and I’ll pull you up afterwards.”

Harry gave her an exasperated look. “Joy, if you do that, one of us is going to get stuck down below with how high these stairs are. There must be an easier way to do this.”

Joy looked around, but couldn’t see any easy way up. She sighed. “It’s too bad we can’t just… fly up there.” Riley stood still hearing that word. She looked down, and began flexing her hands while the other two talked. “Maybe if we look around, there’s a hole we can use to get up.”

“And what if there’s giant rats in there?”

“We haven’t seen anything else in Egopolis. I bet if we find something, we’ll scurry on up without a problem.” Joy then turned, still speaking, only to see empty air. “What do you say Ri-Riley?? Where’d you go Riley!?”

“Riley?” Harry also began looking around.

“Hey you two! Let’s get going,” came Riley’s voice from above them. The two looked up, and saw Riley just hovering there above them, a big smile on her face.

Joy felt the pit of her stomach drop abruptly. “You…you can fly again?”

Riley came down lower. “I…I remembered feeling free and open when I flew…sometime before. I thought maybe it’d be nice to feel that again, and that’s when I started flying.”

Harry looked at Joy, now nervous. “This is Consciousness Tampering for sure,” he whispered.

Joy whispered back, “Yes. Riley did this on her second night after we met you, but this is the fastest way in. We have no choice.” She then looked up at Riley and asked, “Can you make us fly too?”

Riley stretched out her hands. A white light shot out from them, hitting Joy and Harry on the ground. And in no time, Joy and Harry were floating up to Riley. She grabbed their hands, and then proclaimed, “Let’s get in there.”

The three of them rocketed up the stairs. Floating at Riley’s command, and soaring into the door which was left ajar by Paranoia. They then soared down the hall, keeping low to the ground in their caution.

Coming to a large table, they saw a hallway going off to the left. And down the hall, there were 4 sets of stairs. Flying closer, they saw the stairs had a couple different labels on them. One said ‘Dungeon’. One said ‘Abstraction Zone’. One said, ‘Playroom’. And the last one said, ‘Hall of Achievements’.

Harry gave a nod. “Alright, so all we gotta do is fly down to the Dungeon, and hopefully, we’ll get Anger and Fear out.”

Joy was about to agree, when something caught the corner of her eyes. “Hold on a second.” She floated down close to one of the stairs. And picked up something blue. “Candy?” Then she gasped. “Jr!” She looked at Riley. “Jr’s here in the Playroom!”

Riley floated down to the ground, with Harry following behind. “You’re sure?”

“There’s no one else I know who could cry candy to leave here. He’s got to be up there somewhere.”

Riley lightly rubbed her head. Seemingly distracted for a moment. Then looking up the stairs, she frowned. “Then we better go save him. For my memories.”

Harry then pointed to the stairs down. “But what about the others?”

Joy looked between the two humans. Until she remembered what Disgust said near the beginning of their running around. “We’re on the clock. So let’s split up. Harry, you get Anger and Fear, and get them back to the Belief System. We’ll go up and save Jr, and meet you back there as soon as we have him!”

Harry looked like he was ready to argue, but stopped himself, remembering something else said at the beginning of the night. “You’re right. No matter what, I’ll get them out.” Holding up the key in his pocket, he looked at Riley. “I don’t suppose you can turn this into a skeleton key?”

Riley gave a confused look. “I don’t even know what that is. I can’t remember who I am, so how would I know that?”

Harry sighed, but nodded. “Get in, get out, and meet us back where we linked up.”

“Thanks Harry,” the girls both chimed. Then Riley closed her eyes briefly, before they began floating up again, and soared up the stairs.

Harry meanwhile, took a deep breath and ran for the stairs down. “Well, hopefully this doesn’t count as major consciousness tampering,” he mused to himself. Then reaching the top flight, he noticed some smaller stairs off to the right side labeled ‘for new troublemakers’. “Well, that’s easier than going in at least.” And he hurried down the stairs into the darker passage down.

Chapter Text

Chapter 13: Steady Your Emotions

“Where are you Bing Bong Jr? There’s three of us, and only one of you! We’re going to find you soon!”

Jr quickly ran into a castle bedroom. He was surprised there were so many rooms around this castle. But the important thing about this one? No windows. For just a moment, he was sure he couldn’t be seen by the troublemakers.

Jr panted to himself. “This…this isn’t fun! Where are you JOY?” And just as he said that, he heard a light crackle from the bag. Jr scrambled, reaching inside the bag, pulling out the walkie. “He-hello?”

“Jr? Jr, is that you?”

“Joy! You’re okay!”

Joy’s voice sounded considerably brighter. “Yeah, I’m okay. I’m coming to find you, but we have to be safe. Are there any troublemakers around you?”

“You have no idea! I’m playing hide and shriek now, but Narcissism wants to use her scissors on me when she finds me! Get me out of here!”

“Don’t worry, I know you’re up in the playroom. We saw your candy.”

Jr gave a light sniff. “Just like dad.” Then he got a little closer to the walkie. “I’m in some kind of castle right now in the playroom. It kinda reminds me of Princess Dreamworld.”

“I will find you Jr! You can’t hide from Paranoia!”

Jr gulped. “I don’t know how much longer I can hide here.”

“ Then we’ll hurry up and get to you. Stay hidden until then. See you soon Bing Bong Jr. Over.”

Jr breathed a sigh of relief. Then he looked around the room. Looking for a good place to hide. Finally, he spotted a spot he liked, and got in position. “Okay Joy. I’ll be waiting for you.”

Anger looked at Fear in alarm. “What do you mean Riley could become a vegetable?!!?”

Fear nervously wrung his hands. “I talked about this in the subconscious. If Riley’s Stream of Consciousness dries up completely, I don’t know if Riley will ever use her mind properly again.”

Anger kicked the bars in frustration. “We’ve come so far, and Riley might not make it anyways??”

Fear shrunk back slightly at Anger’s temper, but then readjusted himself, and took a step forward. “We can’t worry until we’re back in the upper mind. Just because it’s scary doesn’t mean we have to worry now.” Anger turned to give Fear a confused look. Fear gave a deadpan look. “I’m not always the fearful one. I can plan ahead to keep us safe too.”

Anger huffed that, but also got a more respectful look on his face. “I guess I owe you an apology. You still have that backbone I saw at the start of all this.” Fear gave a firm nod, but that was when they heard someone coming downstairs. Fear shrunk towards the back of the cell, while Anger took a stand right at the cell door. “Alright you punks! You won’t take me alive!” Anger shouted in defiance.

“There’s no need for that, Anger,” a voice came down into the room.

“Harry!”

Harry quickly made his way into the room. Looking a bit overwhelmed by the contrasts. With huge cages right next to smaller prison cells. He came over to the two emotions, now both on their feet and looking at them expectantly.

Harry looked around, before tensely looking back at the others. “Do either of you know where the keys for this are?”

Fear nervously drummed his fingers. “We didn’t see them anywhere.”

Harry looked at the keyhole. It seemed pretty sturdy. But then, he thought of something crazy. “Let me try something.” He reached into his pocket, and pulled out the key Fear gave him.

“The key? But, that’s the key to the Unconscious,” Anger argued.

Harry didn’t answer. He pushed the key into the lock, turned it, and there was a sudden click. The cell door swung open, leaving two very shocked emotions standing there. Harry let out a breath of relief. “It is the key to the Unconscious,” Harry explained. “As in it works on EVERYTHING in the Unconscious.”

Fear now looked at the key with a new sense of reverence and unease. “No wonder Captain Jonas wanted it back.” Then he looked back towards the stairs. “Where are the others?”

“They’re going to get Jr. Follow me. We’re going to FINALLY regroup in the Belief System where it’s safe.”

Anger gave a growl. “And you’re sure we can’t help take those troublemakers down a peg?”

Now Fear and Harry both gave him a deadpan look. But it was Fear who said, “And what are you going to do? Burn their fingers? You couldn’t even hurt Paranoia.”

Anger growled. “Maybe?” Seeing their narrowing eyes, Anger then snarled, “Fine. But I’m still punching something before we get out of here.” As they jogged to the stairs, Anger punched the wall on his way out, leaving a sizable dent in it. “There. That should do it.” As they all climbed the stairs, they didn’t notice that the spot Anger struck began to emanate tiny cracks along the wall.

Despite her nerves at Riley making her fly, Joy couldn’t help but smile as they soared up the stairs. Riley had a determined look on her face, but as they heard some shuffling near the top, they slowed down, with Riley growing concerned. Coming up to the enormous door, they approached the crack, before peering in.

They saw not one, but three huge beings looking around the room. Paranoia was looking at the craft shelf. A tall gray being was poking at the toy chest, while a lady in a queenly costume was pushing around some of the dioramas on another side of the room. And all of them were oozing gloom. The black substance flowing off them like shadows becoming a river. As the darkness went out windows, through the walls, and even down the crack under the door.

Joy nervously floated to the ground, scanning the room, while making sure to land to the side of the gloom. Looking back at Riley, she whispered, “Okay, we just gotta sneak around all these troublemakers. Do you see a large grey structure anywhere?”

Riley narrowed her eyes, scanning the room. “Maybe it’s by the white troublemaker,” she whispered back. “Nothing by the other two looks even close to that.”

Joy peered in that direction, then spotted the castle. Much like Jr said, it did look pretty close to how Princess Dream World did. Though it did look more…rugged compared to the elegance of the one that got torn down.

“We just gotta sneak into that castle.” Joy could see Riley flexing her hand, a thought on her face. “No, we may not pull the castle towards us.”

“I wasn’t gonna!” Riley defensively snapped. “I was just thinking if there might be a way for us to speed over there.”

Joy nervously swallowed. This still was pushing things, but they did have to hurry. “What? Like maybe…teleport over there?”

Riley blinked. Then leaned in. “I can do that?”

Joy nodded. “This is your mind. There are limits, but you could teleport us over there if you tried.”

Riley stared at Joy, then looked back towards the Castle. She took a deep breath, let it out. She closed her eyes, and placed a hand on Joy. And in a flash of light, the two of them were by the castle gates. However, as they took a step, Riley suddenly collapsed onto her knees.

“Riley!” Joy exclaimed. She clamped hands over her mouth, but it was too late. Joy nervously looked behind herself, only to see the grey one looking Joy in the eyes. It seemed to be the only one who really heard her. However, Joy wasn’t going to take any chances. She heaved Riley into her arms, and dragged her inside.

“Wait…come…”

“ Loneliness? Do you see something?”

“Uhh….”

Now in the castle entrance hall, Joy set Riley down as gently as she could for hauling someone taller than herself. Riley looked miserable, but was still conscious. She briefly shook her head, but then looked up at Joy in pained gratitude. “Thanks, Joy.”

 Joy looked down at her girl. “Are you okay?”

Riley groaned, placing a hand on her forehead. “My head hurts. A lot.”

Joy hauled Riley to her feet. “Okay, okay.” Riley eventually steadied herself putting a hand on Joy’s shoulder. “How about we lay off the superpowers for now?”

Riley took a deep breath. “Yeah. At least no more teleporting for now.”

Joy looked up at the many rooms of the castle seen from the inside. “Well, we better get looking. Jr isn’t going to find himself.”

And so, the two of them began checking various rooms in the castle. But no matter where they went, whether the kitchen, the throne room, or the armory, there was no sign of the cotton candy elephant. Finally though, they reached a large bedroom. It was beautifully decorated pink, with several animal statues and portraits around the space.

Walking in, they glanced around, until finally Joy smiled. “I see you,” she said aloud.

“Aw, how did you know?” came a voice.

Joy looked right at one of the pink walls. “You may blend in with the walls, but I’d recognize that bag anywhere.”

The wall moved, and out came Jr, who’d tried to lean against the wall in a way to blend in with it. “Well, at least I don’t have to scream for you, Joy.” Then he noticed who else was there. “Riley!” he joyously screamed.

Riley slowly walked towards the elephant. She looked him over, her face a mixture of bewilderment and regret. “Bing Bong?” she quietly asked.

Jr felt his mood deflate slightly, but he knelt down. Riley was actually tall enough that doing so put them near eye level. “Wow, you’ve gotten taller.” Riley blinked at that, before he went on. “I’m not Bing Bong. He’s gone. But…you knew who he was, so I was created as something very similar. I’m Bing Bong Jr.”

Riley sniffed. Her eyes blinked a few times, then pulled Jr in for a hug. “I…I remember I didn’t want to put him through an identity crisis. I’m sorry I brought it onto you instead.”

Jr wrapped his own arms around Riley. “It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean to. And I’m so glad we got to meet.”

Joy then wrapped her own arms around them both. “Ooh, group hug.” she proclaimed.

Then, the castle shook. “Found you!” came a voice.

Jr gasped. “It’s Narcissism. She’s found us!”

Then they were being jostled about as the floor began to tilt. Joy then knew what was happening. “They’re tilting the Castle!” She grabbed both their hands. “Get ready to run as soon as we fall out!”

Sliding out the room, the three small travelers skidded down the hallways of the castle, sliding towards the front gate.

However, Riley looked terrified as they went. “We’ll never make it out if we’re on foot!” she proclaimed in terror. Moving her outside hand to grab Jr, Riley sent a jolt of white energy into them both at once. “As soon as we fall out, we’re flying out of here!”

“Riley, no! You’re still not-”

“We have no choice!”

At that moment, they were flung out of the castle, and abruptly the three of them glowed bright white as instead of falling into Paranoia’s hands right below them, they instead rocketed forward past them all, and down the stairs.

“GET THEM!” came the scream from behind them as they soared down the stairs. 

Jr for his part was clinging onto Riley and Joy with firm hands. But he was also laughing as he went. “Yeah! That’s what you get for being mean Narcissism!” he shouted back as they flew down.

They soared down the stairs, then across the hallways, before coming out to the outside of the building. As they landed though, Riley at first landed on her feet. Then collapsed straight down. Her legs were not holding her up at all.

“RILEY!!” Jr and Joy were immediately hauling her onto their shoulders.

“Come on, we can’t rest until we’re back in the Belief System!” Joy shouted as they began to move forward supporting Riley. 

“I can’t…” Riley groaned. “I can’t focus on anything. We’ll never make it with you dragging me.”

Joy worriedly looked at Jr. Unsure of what to say. And then, she looked back at the bag still on his back. And she got an idea. Looking back at Riley, she asked, “Do you trust me?”

Riley turned her head slightly. “I…guess?”

Joy then looked back at Jr. “Set her down. I have an idea.” They gently lowered her down. Then Joy held out her hand. “Bag please.”

“But Joy, the only thing left in here is the walkie.”

“Trust me. This is going to work, because I’ve done it before.”

Jr confusedly handed over the bag. At which point, Joy lifted Riley’s legs up, and then slid her inside the bag partway.

Riley looked up at Joy. “What? Why can’t I feel the bottom of this bag?”

Joy grinned. “It’s imaginary.” Then she looked back at Jr. “Can you carry her?”

Jr then smiled back. “Easy Piesy!” He hoisted the bag onto his back, with Riley’s shoulders and hands keeping her from falling all the way inside the bag. She wrapped them around Jr’s shoulders as if she was on a piggyback ride. Then they heard a clatter from behind them. Jr turned to the emotion. “Lead the way Joy.” Joy nodded, and then took off running with Jr right behind her.

Harry, Fear and Anger were right at the edge of the forest. Fear looking all clammed up, and Anger looking annoyed.

“So,” Anger asked. “we just wander into this forest, and get to immovable cliffs that hide Riley’s belief system?”

Harry shrugged. “Pretty much.”

Fear looked backwards at Egopolis. “Can’t believe we’re almost done. Hopefully it’s not too late.”

Then they heard a slight crashing sound, and looking back, they saw Joy, Jr and Riley now running down the street.

“Riley!” both Fear and Anger said, with varying degrees of joy, unease and confusion seeing her inside Bing Bong’s bag.

“No time for greetings! Run! ” called Joy. Before any of the boys could ask why, they saw Narcissism skitter into view.

“ I’m first! I’m always first!” it said as it stormed in front of Loneliness and Paranoia. “ Riley, come back here! Your Queen demands it! I know what’s best because I’ll always put YOU first!”

“And I’ll always protect you! You need me way more than you need Fear!” added Paranoia coming right behind her. Loneliness for its part was just running behind the other two, a conflicted look on its face.

Looking back at his traveling team, Fear briefly deadpanned, “Shall we run for our lives?”

As Joy and her group came within a few paces, Anger answered in equal deadpan. “Eh, might as well.” Then all three of them gave a little scream of fear, and started running right alongside Joy, Jr and Riley into the forest.

Harry looked over to Riley as they ran. “Can’t you just make us fly out of here?”

Riley shook her head. “I can’t! I…I can barely focus right now. I nearly knocked myself out the last time I tried!”

Harry looked back at Joy, who shook her head. “She can’t use her abilities too regularly in the Unconscious. We have to give it time before we try again.” Joy then saw they were starting to enter the underbrush of the forest, and despite the danger, she narrowed her eyes in determination. “Everyone, follow me. I’ll get us to the Belief System!”

Fear meanwhile slowed up slightly. “I’ll take the rear. That way I can protect you all if we get seperated.”

STOMP!

Suddenly, another enormous emotion appeared to the right of them. “ Found you !” It was Spite. Everyone screamed in fear again, and dodged to the left.

“Don’t stop. No matter what, don’t stop moving!!” screamed Fear, as he jumped over a fallen log. “Keep your eyes on Joy, and don’t stop until we’re safe!” And so the crew was off. With Jr in the center, Harry and Anger on the sides, while Joy kept point through the Forest.

They came to a hill, all of them running at top speed. Then Fear looked behind himself, seeing Spite draw his sword. “Move right!” he called. As Spite brought the sword down, the group dodged, with the sword coming down on the hill, splitting it in half. Then Fear looked back again. “Duck!” So everyone ducked, and Spite sliced off the tops of the trees around them.

“How are you so strong??” Anger shouted as he ran.

“My energy for hurting others is BOUNDLESS!!” Spite sliced down again, the group dodging left, causing another hill to be created. “And don’t worry. We need the emotions and Riley alive. I’ll just knock you out and then get out of here!” He then scoffed at Jr and Harry. “The imaginary beings on the other hand….” He left the idea hanging.

This went on for a minute or so, until they could see the cliff ahead. But Spite had one last thing to say as they got closer. “ Don’t you get it Riley? You need me to crush all those who deceive and hate us! Nothing is beyond our wrath! Not Hockey, not our friends, not our Family! Why do you think you want to stay here anyways!!?”

Riley shivered in worry listening to her Spite’s declarations. Jr though reached a hand back to hold hers. Riley looked down at him in concern. But Jr just smiled as they ran. And that made Riley a bit more relaxed.

They got closer and closer to one of the holes to get in, but Spite’s enormous size meant they were about to be caught. “EVERYONE SLIDE!!” called Anger. And as they reached one of the streams, the whole group jumped.

“ No!” shouted Spite, who then lunged at them. However, the distance was just short enough as one by one, the whole group slid into the hole, and Spite instead impacted on the cliff. Too big to get in. And from the impact, the reverberations went up the wall into the upper mind.

Chapter Text

Disgust and Envy sat in the locomotive of a Train of Thought. The train was traveling straight across the tarp covered dump, occasionally giving a whistle as it traveled. It also was punching tiny holes into the tarps as the tracks were laid down along the way. Something nobody noticed as they stared straight ahead to the other side.

Disgust leaned on the side of the cab, taking it easy. Envy meanwhile was by the driver, and asked questions all along the way. Though most of them were asking if she could drive. Which he’d given a firm no.

Finally, Envy stopped her chattering for a second to catch her breath. And then asked a question that was a little more specific. Jolting Disgust to attention hearing it. “How are you driving if Riley’s unconscious?”

The driver pointed to a moon on the upper part of the furnace. “This is the night train. It usually operates when Riley’s asleep. Just because Dream Productions gets most of the attention doesn’t mean we stop working. And as long as Riley’s Stream of Consciousness is flowing, this train will never stop running.”

Disgust gave a little “huh” at that. But it did make sense. “Well, at least it’s a straight shot from here back to the others.”

BOOM!

The train suddenly rocked like an earthquake hit it. In the jolt, Envy slipped, and nearly went over the edge. “Help!” she called. Disgust grabbed her hand, but at that moment…

BOOM!

Another shockwave hit, and Disgust slid over the edge. She and Envy fell off the train, landing on one of the tarp strips several meters down.

“What in Brain Freezing was that??” asked Envy.

However, before Disgust could respond, there was a sudden ripping noise. Disgust looked back the way they came, and saw ripping. One of the rear cars had detached and was buried halfway in the tarp, and now the tear on the piece they were currently hanging on was starting to grow. “Oh no,” she moaned. And next thing either of them knew, the tarp strip broke, and the two emotions were sent flying towards the far side of the memory dump. Both of them clinging to the tarp as hard as they could and screaming all the way.

Finally, the two of them swung close to the side of the cliff where the islands of personality were. Due to air resistance, they didn’t slam into the cliff, but the currents did cause Disgust to lose her grip. She hung in the air for a half second, before Envy grabbed her hand. But immediately, they sagged down, as Envy strained with all her might to not let go of the sudden weight.

“Grab the Tarp! I can’t hold you!” yelled Envy in fear. But everything was happening too fast, and as soon as it was said, Disgust slipped from Envy’s grasp. She tried to grab onto the Tarp again, but the momentum was too sudden and fast, and Disgust plummeted into the memory dump. 

Envy immediately screamed, “Disgust! NO!” She almost let go herself, but then reconsidered. “Nobody will save us if they don’t know what happened,” she murmured to herself. So, she took a deep breath and screamed as loud as possible, while starting to climb up. “HEY! Pull me up! I’m still here, and we need help!”

Disgust meanwhile fell down, down, down into darkness. Until finally she landed on glass. “OW!” she exclaimed. Slowly pulling herself back up. “I guess we are partially invulnerable. But that still hurts,” she groaned. Disgust briefly cricked her back, but as she stood up straight again, she immediately jumped up in fear. Realizing what happened. “Ah! No! No! I’m too important to be forgotten!!” She nearly tripped over immediately on the uneven pile of forgotten memories, but caught herself with a foot backward. Then she looked around herself, and noticed that not every orb here was grey. “What? What are the forgetters doing up there?” she then asked herself. Disgust took a few steps forward, then noticed some orbs that looked unusually bright compared to even the ones which weren’t forgotten yet. So, she began making her way over there. Walking over the orbs felt weird, but after a bit of a struggle, and nearly losing a shoe, she finally got there. However, upon reaching the brighter orbs, she gave a gasp of distress.

One orb was silent. It was tinted yellow and blue, and the picture showed Riley hugging her parents on the floor. One orb was tinted yellow and red, showing Riley skating and scoring a goal to cheers from her teammates. The final one showed Riley and Ann together in class. There also wasn’t much sound coming out, but the two were smiling at each other, with red, blue and yellow colors. But despite how bright they all were, the orbs were all mostly grey with only hints of color on the outside rim giving them shading.

“The Core Memories?? What are these doing in the dump? I thought we held onto these when we left Headquarters!” Disgust grabbed them up, frowning in confusion. Then she looked a little in front of herself and she recognized another sphere. “Isolation!”

Disgust walked forward a few steps, before looking at that troublesome Core Memory which had gloom infused into it right at her feet. Watching Riley screaming in frustration before running away, Disgust could feel her temper flaring. “This is all your fault!” she snapped. “If Riley didn’t create you, she never would’ve pushed away everyone!” She gave the core a kick, only to suddenly trip and fall on the ground. And unfortunately, she also dropped the other cores next to it. As she went to pick Friendship up again, she quickly discovered something very strange. The cores were now stuck together, with Isolation now connected to the other three like a pyramid.

“What?” Disgust asked in confusion. She tried to get a hand in between them all to get Isolation off, but they truly seemed stuck together. “How the-Riley! You need these!” she shouted as if Riley was somehow controlling what happened to her cores from far away. But after a few seconds of struggle, nothing could get the memories apart. Huffing in a flare of emotion, Disgust looked at the greyed out pictures of all the memories that made up the best parts of Riley’s personality. Memories she didn’t create despite approving of them. Disgust bit her lip in frustration, and then sighed. “Oh Riley. I’m so sorry I couldn’t protect you. I know you kept saying you don’t hate us, but…I wish you’d trusted us too.” She looked back up to where she knew Imagination Land would be over the cliff. She never felt more connected to Joy than she did right now knowing what it was like to be in the dump with emotional distress weighing on her.

Disgust looked back at Isolation Island’s orb, seeing her own color in the mix. And as she looked at it, she shook her head, her eyes hardening once more in determination. “You made this, but we’re still part of it,” she muttered. “If you want to be with us so much, then you can’t push us away too.” Then in a sudden outburst of frustration, Disgust screamed at the cores, “I love you TOO MUCH to let you go!” Little did Disgust notice that a touch of green coloring entered all the orbs as she spoke, removing some of the grey coloring in the process.

Then came a crackle from the walkie still attached to her belt. “ Disgust, can you read me? Are you okay?”

Disgust broke out of her moment, and looked down at her walkie. She sniffed in both relief and annoyance. Pulling it up, she snarked, “Oh, I’m great, Envy. Just a bundle of joy.”

Envy’s voice was filled with relief. “ Oh, thank goodness. Listen, Paula is ready to bring ‘her finest production’ to get you out of there. Try and get closer to the center of the dump so we can see you easier.”

“It’s a little hard to walk around here!”

“ It’s the only way we’ll get an accurate shot!”

“Ugh! Fine! Hold on.” Holding the cores in her arms, Disgust gingerly made her way closer to where Headquarters would’ve been.

BOOM!

As the memory dump shook once again, Disgust barely found her footing as she continued to move forward. “What is going on??” she complained. “Why are we getting earthquakes up here?”

BOOM!

“Knock it off down there!” she griped, as she finally got a little farther out. Then pulling out her walkie, she said, “Is this better Envy?”

“ Good enough. Just stay perfectly still, and we’ll send down the toys!”

“Toys?”

Then suddenly, a large shadow came over Disgust. It continued to grow, and grow, until it looked like it was going to hit her. She gave a shriek, and placed herself over the Core memories, but instead, it hovered just above her. Then a second large object landed on the other side. It was the mechanized flying robots she’d watch build the temporary tarp. Only now, they carried a large tarp strip between the two of them.

Looking up at the mind workers inside, Disgust held up her hands carrying the orbs. “I need to bring these with me! I can’t just shimmy up this.”

One of the mind workers stuck their head out a window of the Dragon. Revealing a blue head with straight looking hair. “Don’t worry. This is all part of the plan. We’re going to fly out a bit. You get onto the tarp as soon as you can, then we’ll take care of the rest.”

“Okay,” Disgust uneasily responded. The Butterfly and Dragon again took off, flying parallel to the memory dump, as the tarp they carried got lower and lower to the ground. Finally, Disgust tossed her pyramid of memories up when it was low enough, then scrambled onto the tarp herself, grumbling about ‘need to wash my dress’ as she climbed up.

Then, the Tarp began to be lifted up. Slowly rising as the two large robots flapped their mechanical wings. Bringing her higher and higher, until suddenly, they began reversing direction. The tarp began to slack, until the two vehicles stopped again. Then they activated boosters in their rear, and shot forward. And from the sudden snap, Disgust was launched into the air like she was on a trampoline. She immediately exclaimed in surprise (the Fear kind rather than the Joy kind), but clutched the Cores as they went up. The wind soared all around her, as she lurched up and up. Until at last they reached a top point. Then Disgust felt herself lurch. “Oh great,” she deadpanned, and then she screamed as she fell another 20 feet or so down out of the dump, still holding onto the core memories.

“Really?” she proclaimed in a heap on the ground. “You used the tarps to become impromptu trampolines to shoot me out of the dump?! That’s your finest production??”

Paula was standing nearby, and she gave Disgust a bored look. “It worked, didn’t it? It’s a perfect tribute to how Joy saved us all last year. And it makes great use of what we had on hand.”

Disgust slowly pulled herself up, and gave a low moan, but made eye contact with Paula. “Fair enough. Thank you Paula.”

“You’re welcome.”

THUD.

The ground shook once more, though it was a bit more muted. Disgust slowly pulled herself up, but made sure to grab onto the Cores immediately after. “I think we’re going to restore Headquarters pretty soon. You can tell your teams they can start removing the tarps if they’re keeping it tight right now.”

Paula gave a mock salute. “Yes ma'am," she chortled, before heading back towards Dream Productions.

“Disgust!” Disgust then had to take a step back, as Envy jumped straight onto her waist, holding her tightly. “Are you okay? You didn’t lose a hand or any fingers down there, did you?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine,” Disgust soothed slightly awkwardly. “Now can you please let go of me?”

Envy dropped back down. “Sorry, I…I just got so worried when you fell into the dump. I didn’t want Riley to forget you after she woke up.”

Disgust smirked. “It’ll take more than a few minutes to forget someone like me!” Then she looked at the orbs in her hands with a more uncertain look. “Although it does seem Riley forgot her personality after the collapse.”

Envy peered at the orbs, then gasped. “Core memories?? What were they doing in the dump?”

“They must’ve fallen in when the Train of Thought first crashed.” Both emotions turned to see Sadness walking towards them, a serious look on her face. “But I’m glad you found them, Disgust.”

Disgust took a second to recompose herself, then looked down at Sadness. “Did you find the missing manual?”

Sadness nodded, holding up Advanced Console Operations. “Yes.”

“And did the train from the Pituitary Assembly make it across?”

A whistle sounded, as the night train pulled up next to them, though missing a few cars. Mind workers began coming off the train, various supplies in hand. The conductor approached the three emotions. “Alright, where do you want the new console?”

Sadness waved him over. “Follow me. We’ll start rebuilding the console next to the mind manuals. Make it easy for everyone. Advanced Console Operations is available for any special changes.” And so Sadness led a train of mind workers and 2 emotions over to their ‘base camp’. As Embarrassment, Nostalgia and Ennui all looked up in surprise and relief at everyone coming in.

Disgust looked at the 2 unfamiliar emotions. “So many new faces. I hope we have enough space once we fix Headquarters,” she deadpanned. Embarrassment looked positively ashamed at that comment, but Nostalgia just gave a little shrug. Ennui meanwhile gave a deadpan look, which Disgust couldn’t help but respect. “So, any word from the teams in the Unconscious? I last heard from Joy at least a few hours ago.”

“Not for a while,” lulled Ennui. “But we do have good news for them.”

“Oh?”

Nostalgia soothed, “We know how to get them out of there.” Then she patted Embarrassment's hand. “This tall gentleman was kind enough to find it for us.” Embarrassment pulled his hoodie over his face and ducked away, thoroughly embarrassed by the attention.

Off to the side, Sadness quickly and quietly told the mind workers what they were looking for in a repaired console, who then gathered around to begin their work. But as Sadness gave them a thumbs up, the emotions all took a seat and Sadness turned to explain what their exit plan would be.

For a moment, the Belief System was quiet after a splash sounded through the cavern. Then Joy bobbed to the surface. Followed by Harry, Anger, Fear, and finally, Bing Bong Jr carrying Riley. Exhausted and shaken, the travelers swam over to the patch of land in the middle, and slumped down on their backs and stomachs. Nobody moved for several seconds, all of them taking time to regain their energy and catch their breath.

Finally, Riley spoke up. “Can someone pull me out of this bag please?”

Hauling to their feet, Joy, Anger and Fear all took a hold of Riley’s arms, and gently pulled her out of the imaginary bag. With Riley now resting on her knees, Fear got down to Riley’s level, nervously looking her over.

“Are you okay Riley? Please tell me you didn’t hurt yourself.”

However, then Fear was shoved to the side, as Anger now was in front of Riley’s face. “You little Punk! Don’t you scare me like that again! No more suppressing us or destroying your mind, got it?!”

Joy got in front of Riley protectively. “Whoa, whoa, slow down Anger. Riley’s not in good shape now. And besides…maybe we should ease her into all this?”

“What?” he asked.

“No, no. It’s okay, Joy. I know enough.” Joy stepped to the side at that. Both emotions watched as Riley slowly rocked backwards into a sitting position. “I know I did something terrible that caused me to forget who I was. With everything I’ve seen and heard down here, that much is clear.”

At that, Anger took a step back in surprise. “You…don’t know me?”

Riley tilted her head. “You’re…Anger, right?” Anger nodded, still a little uneasy. Then she looked to the side at the 3rd emotion nervously twiddling his thumbs. “And you’re…Fear?”

Fear looked over at Joy. “What happened?”

Joy shrugged, watching as Riley slowly got to her feet. “She was like this when I found her. Riley doesn’t have total amnesia, but she doesn’t remember us or the big things about her life. No Minnesota, no San Francisco, no Family, no Friends, no Hockey.”

Fear grabbed Riley by the sides of her head in worry. “Riley, what’s the capital of California?”

“I…don’t know?”

“Your favorite food?”

“What’s food?”

“Favorite color?”

“Uhhhh…your color?”

“NOOOO!!!!”

*Smack*

Fear promptly was sent toppling over the memory orbs still on the shore. He shook his head. “Thanks, Anger. I needed that.”

Anger for his part looked a little smug, but then looked at the 2 orbs. “Possibility?” He then turned back to Joy. “Was Riley holding this down here the whole time?”

“I found her with it,” said Joy. “It was the only core we didn’t get.”

Fear looked up at Riley, pointing at Possibility. “Did you get bonked in the head by that? Is that why you forgot us?”

Riley looked extremely confused at that. “I don’t know? How could I know if I don’t even know how I got here?”

Fear nervously fidgeted at that answer. “It was one of my worst case scenarios,” he mumbled to himself.

Anger gave a bit of a quizzical look at that remark, but then looked over the many threads in the cavern. Changing the subject, he said, “You know, this place is pretty cool. Add in some disco lights, and this could make for a good dance floor.”

Harry looked a bit disturbed at the thought as he stood up. “Where would you even hang it?”

“By the central column of course,” Anger snipped. Then he relaxed. “After all our troubles getting here, it’s actually nice to have a quiet, safe place in the Unconscious.”

THUD

The cavern lightly shook, and one thread abruptly snapped.

BOOM

A few rocks fell down from the ceiling into the pool.

“You can’t hide in there forever Riley! You will come out of there!”

And the pounding continued from there, though with less obvious effects. Everyone inside looked at each other nervously. An unspoken conversation passing between Joy, Anger and Harry. Then Joy reached for her walkie, and brought it up to her mouth. Her expression was somewhere between worry and concern.

“Can anyone hear me near the manuals? We have a problem,” she called in.

It was Disgust who answered first. “ Joy? What is going on down there? We almost weren’t able to repair the console because of the earthquakes.”

“We’ve got a host of troublemakers trying to get out! And they’re trying to get to our hiding place!” Anger proclaimed into his walkie, his face showing scorn and frustration.

“ Anger? What do you mean…troublemakers?” came Ennui’s loose but nervous voice.

Anger counted on his fingers while speaking. “There’s four we’re trying to get around. Loneliness, Paranoia, Spite and Narcissism.”

“ Where are you all now? Is it safe for you to talk?” Envy was the voice that came out from that question through Joy’s walkie.

Fear grabbed the walkie out of Harry’s hands, now talking almost a mile a minute into it. “We made it back to the Belief System, but we shouldn’t stay here too long. I think Spite is trying to force a way in.”

There was a brief silence, and then Sadness spoke from the other side. “We’ve been studying some of the manuals, and I think we have an exit plan.”

Joy watched as Riley drifted back towards Possibility Island’s core memory. Playing it back to herself quietly with Jr sitting next to her. Riley’s eyes looked at Joy briefly with a whole host of emotions dancing over her face. Then Riley scooted next to Jr with both orbs next to them. “Good, good.” Joy half mumbled from the brief distraction. Refocusing again, she asked, “How do we do that?”

“We’re going to pull you all out through Abstract Thought,” explained Disgust.

Fear nervously asked, “What? But isn’t it impossible to get back up through there?”

Sadness then spoke with precision and seriousness. “ Manual 8 does talk about some special circumstances where a troublemaker can reemerge through the tube for short actions at Headquarters request. While we can’t use the console for obvious reasons, we can use the same principles to extract you all through Abstract Thought.”

Joy smiled at the recitation. “You really do know the manuals better than all of us. Don’t you, Sadness?”

In a more sheepish tone, Sadness responded, “ More or less I suppose. Do you have Riley with you like Ennui said?”

“We do. Sadness, how do we restore her memories?”

“We’ll talk about it after you get back up here.” After a pause, Sadness then asked, “One last thing: do you know if you have enough memories to repower Headquarters like the manuals said?”

Joy sheepishly scratched her head. “Well, we haven’t exactly had a lot of time to count them with all the rescues that needed to happen.”

Disgust’s voice then came in much stronger than before. “Count how many there are. That will help us figure out how many we might need to send down there.”

“I’m on it,” came Fear’s voice as everyone looked over to him now pointing at memories while whispering numbers to himself.

“Now, here’s the general idea of how to get everyone out of The Unconscious.” And Sadness began going over what needed to happen. Joy, Anger and Harry all listened carefully, while Riley and Jr paid some attention as well. All of them nodded and swallowed as troublemakers continued to hammer outside. A few other ideas were thrown out as they talked. Some details were left up in the air as they needed a better lay of the land beforehand. Yet by the time they finished talking, everyone was finally ready to reunite as one.

Chapter Text

Chapter 15: Meanwhile, On the Outside 2: Breaking Points

Friday Morning…

Ann felt a prickling fear and sadness as she walked down the school hallways. Nothing made sense to her. Her friend was in the hospital. She might’ve become schizophrenic, but Riley was so healthy before this week. How could something like this happen?

Last night still hung in her mind. After making it home, she’d immediately given her mother a tearful hug. Telling her everything. Trying to push her fears out through her arms. She couldn’t just shake off her emotions, but her mom did promise to help after hearing Ann’s desire to go back to the Andersens if Riley didn’t wake up tomorrow.

“ This isn’t just about Riley anymore. It’s about her whole family. And we’ll support them through it all.”

Later that night, her dad came into Ann’s room before she went to bed. After hearing the news, he’d come straight up from his shift at the hospital. Ann wasn’t entirely sure if he helped with Riley’s care, but she still remembered his words.

“ Riley’s in good hands. I promise we’ll take care of her until she comes out of it.”

Ann then took Jordan’s music advice. She didn’t know what could be considered relaxing after the pain she was feeling, so she ended up going with a shuffle feature for “comfort music” on her phone. And, to her surprise, Jordan was right to a degree. The mixture of both sorrowful and soothing music did help her fall asleep.

However, her dreams weren’t exactly comforting. She had trouble fully remembering them, but there was something about Riley calling for help inside a giant brain. A part of a dream where she was swimming through a river of tears. And there was a brief dream when she’d seen a monster with Tracy’s signature skull t-shirt trying to drag Riley away from her. Honestly it was a miracle she’d slept through it all, but somehow she woke up shaken, but rested.

“What a week,” Ann thought to herself as she mechanically moved down the hall. “It started off so nice, but Riley just kept getting worse and worse! Thank God it’s Friday. I don’t think I could focus on school one more day after all this!” It was just before lunch time, and she made her way towards her locker. Ann let out a sigh. She’d held her emotions together, but it hadn’t been easy. She just wanted to be done with it all. Not worry at all about…

“Hey Ann! Where are all your friends now?”

Ann bit back a sharp remark about Jordan’s locker being in a different hallway. Instead, she closed her locker, and walked a few steps away to meet Tracy in the middle of the hall.

“What now Tracy? After what I called you on Wednesday, I thought you’d be more careful with your words.”

Tracy rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “Well it won’t be the last time I’m called something that rude. You’ll have to try harder if you really want to hurt my feelings.”

Ann brushed past Tracy. Determined to just walk away. “I have nothing else to say to you.” she said briskly.

“And I suppose you have much more you’d like to say to Riley?” Ann stopped, and turned her head slightly to look back at Tracy. “We both know she’s been out of school for two days now.” The hallway began to get quiet. Kids paused in putting their stuff away as they watched the two girls in the middle of the hall now staring each other down. Others mumbled that it was a little strange Riley wasn’t with them today. “You wouldn’t happen to know where she is, would you?”

Ann kept her mouth shut. The last thing she wanted right now was to lose the grip she had on her emotions since this morning. Or give Tracy any more reason to tear down her friend.

“Nothing?” Tracy sniffed haughtily, then took a few steps closer. “Well, after how she’s been acting, maybe she just couldn’t handle being around normal people anymore.”

“Stop it,” Ann spoke with a growing anger, as she turned back towards Tracy.

“We all saw the signs. Even YOU can’t deny what Mr. O’Brian was teaching us about Schizophrenia.”

“Tracy-”

“Maybe you just can’t admit that Riley’s finally getting the help she needs.”

Ann’s eyes narrowed, even as she could feel a lump coming to her throat. She murmured, “Riley IS getting the help she needs. But…” Ann hesitated again, trying very hard not to get into it.

Tracy almost looked relieved hearing that, but then narrowed her own eyes back at Ann. “But what? Isn’t this right? Riley is finally EXACTLY where she belongs. And she’ll never ever threaten us again.”

Ann took in a sharp breath. She could feel her hands start to tremble. Her breath became quicker. She lowered her head to hide her eyes. With as much effort as she could, she gave a very shaky, barely controlled, “W..hh.aaat?”

“You heard me,” Tracy said. “Riley Andersen is exactly where someone like her ought to be. I’d think after how she’s treated you, you’d get it. We’re better off without that dangerous, crazy freak!”

Things went dead silent in Ann’s Headquarters. All her emotions stared in disbelief at what Tracy just said.

Sadness could already feel a tear welling up. Joy began stammering in shock. Fear regained herself a second later, but then slowly turned to look at Disgust and Anger who both looked absolutely furious.

Anger began moving towards the center of the console. Fear quickly stepped in front of her. “Now Anger, let’s not…”

“I’VE HAD ENOUGH OF TRACY!” Anger bellowed. Smacking Fear away from the console, She marched to the very center where two levers were waiting. “IT’S TIME TO GIVE HER WHAT SHE DESERVES!”

Sadness then stopped Anger’s arm before she could do anything. Anger looked ready to push Sadness away too, but she spoke before Anger could act. “Let me back you up. Tracy NEEDS to understand what she’s done!”

Disgust stepped onto the other side, also placing a hand on Anger’s shoulder. “Me Too! It’s time to cut this poison out of our lives FOREVER!”

Anger gave a cold nod to Sadness, and a growl of acknowledgment to Disgust. While they both stepped up to press buttons, Anger grabbed the levers, and thrust them up, screaming as loud as possible while her hair caught on fire.

“RRRRAAAAAAAAHHHHH…..”

“AAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!”

For two seconds, the entire hallway was silent, and then Ann screamed. With a quick motion, she reeled back and punched Tracy across the face. Tracy was caught completely by surprise. She spun around from the momentum, nearly landing against one of the lockers. But Ann immediately followed up by slamming Tracy against them, her eyes filled with rage and tears, her mouth in a furious expression.

“ Take it back! Take it back RIGHT NOW !”

Despite her initial surprise, Tracy scowled back. “Why should I? You KNOW it’s the truth!”

Ann’s snarl only deepened, as tears began falling down her face. She slammed Tracy against the locker again. “You don’t know anything Tracy! You don’t get to say that anymore!”

“What are you-”

“RILEY’S IN THE HOSPITAL YOU IGNORANT COW! SHE COULD DIE!”

A terrible silence briefly settled over the hallway. All the kids nearby started at Ann’s declaration. Several of them started to whisper to each other in surprise and shock. Some looked with sympathy. Some also hardened their expressions at Tracy, while others were afraid at Ann’s enraged face.

“NOW, TAKE! IT! BACK! Or I’ll send you to the nurse’s office in Black and Blue!”

Tracy looked terrified on one hand, but another emotion danced across her face. Ann was too angry to notice, but Tracy knew exactly what she was feeling: regret.

“I….Ann, I…”

A new voice suddenly cut in. “What is going on here??”

“I’m not done with Tracy!”

“Oh, I think you are, Ann Jones!” Hearing her full name, Ann finally turned her head, seeing the principal standing to the side of her. “You’re going to let her go, and then we’re going to my office to sort out what just happened here.”

Ann seethed. She wanted nothing more than to knock Tracy’s lights out in front of everyone. But, her sadness finally eclipsed her fury, and she dropped Tracy, while wiping her eyes. She still felt that burning anger inside, but it was being tempered by reason and grief. “Fine!” she growled. Ann then shot Tracy one more hard glare, and shouted, “Don’t EVER talk that way about Riley again!”

The principal took Ann’s hand before she could say anything else, but also gave Tracy a firm glance. “You go to the nurse’s office for now Tracy. Make sure nothing got bruised or cut. I’ll come by to see you after you’re checked out.”

As Ann was led away, Tracy very quietly mumbled to herself, “Sorry.”

Ann sat in the principal’s office. Staring at the wall. She wished she was anywhere else right now, but not out of fear. She felt disgusted to have to talk about what just happened. This wasn’t right. Not for Riley. Not for her. If anything, she wished Riley had just given in to her anger and done something like this sooner.

With a huff, she then looked out the window. Wiping her eyes which still were a little poofy. She was also missing lunch soon. She sighed. Hopefully they’d finish up sooner rather than later.

The Principal came back in after conferring with his secretary. Ann gave him the angriest glare she could muster, which admittedly wasn’t nearly as intense as what her Anger produced earlier. He had a serious look on his face as he sat down on the other side of the desk. He gave her an expectant look, but Ann still didn’t say anything. The Principal then sternly spoke. “Well Ann Jones, care to explain what happened out there?”

Ann growled. “My actions speak for themselves.”

He raised an eyebrow at that. “You know we have a zero tolerance policy for fights of any kind in this school. I can easily give the most harsh punishment possible if you don’t explain what happened.”

Ann looked away at that, her face stubbornly set. A flicker of uncertainty came across her face, but she muttered, “You wouldn’t understand.”

He sighed. “Maybe then you can tell someone who might understand.” Ann was startled out of her brooding by that. And seeing her confused reaction, he elaborated. “If you don’t trust me, then I know someone on staff who you might be more comfortable telling your side of things to.”

Ann rolled her eyes, but shrugged. “Whomever you pick, it probably won’t work.”

At that, the principal gave an arrogant smirk. “Oh I think it will. Wait here.”

As he walked out, Ann still stared straight ahead, determined to never give another inch. She waited for what felt like 5 minutes, until finally the door opened again.

“Hello Ann.”

Ann immediately felt herself freeze. Indeed, she knew that voice quite well. She immediately turned around. “Mrs Adams?”

It was Jordan’s mom. She looked a little frumpy, but gracefully took a seat. Not in front of the desk, but in one of the other chairs on Ann’s side. She gave Ann a wane smile, then leaned back. “I never thought I’d see BOTH of Jordan’s friends getting in trouble this week.”

Ann growled slightly. “Tracy started it!”

Mrs. Adams held up her hands. “All Principal Black told me is that you were heard threatening Tracy with violence. I haven’t heard from any other students yet. I know this is complicated since we know each other outside of school, but I’m not here to take sides. I just want to hear what happened from you.”

Ann backed down slightly, before swallowing. It would be easier to tell Jordan’s mother what happened, but her internal thought process was muddled. She didn’t know how to talk about Riley to any adult who might not care or understand everything Riley thought or went through this week. Ann sniffed, then mumbled, “I don’t know what to say.”

Mrs. Adams pressed again. “Well, why don’t we start with how things are going outside of school?” Ann looked confused at that. “No matter your past with Tracy, I know you wouldn’t become so aggressive without something else affecting your mood.”

Ann crossed her arms. Sarcastically saying, “Of course. You’re our counselor after all.”

Mrs. Adams smiled. “Like I said, I’m not here to take sides. But I know you Ann, and I know this isn’t normal behavior for you.”

Ann could feel herself getting emotional again. She swallowed, still angry, but again feeling her sadness fighting for space again. “Please,” she whispered. “Don’t make me say it. I’ve cried enough these last few days!”

Mrs Adams then interlaced her hands, and leaned forward. “This has to do with Riley, doesn’t it?”

Ann turned her head away, desperately trying not to open up. “No! I mean…why do you think that?”

The councilor now gave a wane smile. “Because I know what happened to her Wednesday night. And I’m pretty sure you know too.”

Ann whipped her head back around. “What?! How do-”

“Does it matter?”

“Of course it matters! How can Riley ever trust us again if our parents keep finding out our secrets??”

Mrs Adams shook her head. “This wasn't a secret. It is a tragedy.”

Ann could feel her walls of emotional control start collapsing again, but this time she diverted her pain through her anger instead. “Tracy never should've said such horrible things! She called Riley a crazy, dangerous freak! I had to do something!”

Mrs Adams jolted back at that. Clearly shocked by the accusation. Then she took a deep breath as if she also needed a minute to breathe. “Did she know Riley was in the hospital?”

“She shouldn’t ever say something like that! Even if Riley was here.”

“Ann-”

“Tracy’s wrong! Riley doesn’t belong in a hospital!” Ann could feel her voice rising as she could feel herself beginning to rant. “Riley can't die! She can't! Why didn't she just get help? Why didn't she know how much we cared about her?!”

Mrs. Adams swallowed, and shook her head in sorrow. She got it. She fully understood how big this had gotten for Ann. “The mind is a mysterious thing. We can't know her reasons until she's better.”

Ann looked down, her mind filled with both anger and sadness. “I hate Tracy. Bad enough she nagged Riley into thinking I’m a traitor, but to call her that? It’s too far!”

“Ann-”

“I won’t apologize! I won’t! She doesn’t deserve it!”

Mrs. Adams held up her hands again. “I never asked you to.” Ann calmed down a little at that. So then the school councilor spoke again. “Ann, you’re emotionally compromised from all this.” Ann opened her mouth, but Mrs. Adams beat her to it again. “I’m going to recommend that Principal Black call your parents to take you home. You’re in no condition to focus during class. Especially since you have 3 more classes with Tracy.”

Ann snorted in anger. “I suppose so.”

Mrs. Adams then gave Ann a sad look. “I’m sorry this got so bad. But if you want to talk about it more, I’m sure your mom and I can discuss it when we meet up this afternoon.”

“What?”

“If you’re going to Riley’s home after school, the Adams family will be coming with you too.”

Ann didn’t say anything to that. Then she looked down. “Is this going on my record?” The councilor nodded. “Well, that’s just great,” she grumbled. She got a pat on the shoulder afterwards, but for Ann, the worst part of the day was decisively over. No more school, and no more Tracy.

Friday Afternoon…

Bill and Jill Andersen were back home. Bill was currently working on taxes. And Jill was restocking the refrigerator after a grocery run. Both of them had somber looks on their faces, but both were seemingly holding together alright.

Bill looked up at his wife. “Sorry I couldn’t get time off work until after lunch. We had an emergency meeting come up.” Jill looked back, but shrugged. Seemingly unbothered. Bill went on. “You went in to visit Riley today, right?” Jill nodded. “Any change?” Jill shook her head. “Did you tell her any stories while there?”

Jill gave a half smile at the question. “I tried reminding her of when we went on that full day hike when she was 8, and she begged me to carry her back home after lunch.” Both of them chuckled at that. “Yeah, I would’ve sworn she’d wake up from the embarrassment alone.” Their laughs trailed off after that. Jill finally finished putting away some chicken, sighing to herself, before turning back to her husband as she closed the refrigerator. “Bill, what are we going to do?”

Bill looked down at his hands as he put down the pen he was holding. He looked just as distressed, and nervously rubbed his fingers, trying to come up with an answer. Finally, he looked back up and murmured three words. Three words that neither of them liked. “I don’t know.” He took a deep breath, then continued. “We can keep doing what we are now, but there’s nothing else to be done until Dr. Cooley has more to work with.”

Jill looked down. Anger, sadness and fear laced through her voice. “How could Riley end up like this? All the symptoms for Schizophrenia were there. Why didn’t she trust us about getting her diagnosed? And how could she have such a massive headache and not have it diagnosed?”

Bill shrugged sadly. “It is…disturbing in its own way. I just don’t get how everything this week went so wrong.”

Jill bitterly muttered, “At least Riley finally asked for help right before she collapsed.”

Bill replied, “No changes and no messages at least means there’s no new bad news. And with my startup’s new healthcare plan, we should be fine financially at least for now.”

Jill looked Bill in the eyes. Distress still all over her face.  “This is our daughter! Our only child! How can you be so calm about this?”

“I’m not!” Jill flinched at that statement. “Of course I’m not! But worrying about it without anything else changing won’t help us.” Bill stood up, pacing a little. Then he came over to Jill’s side of the table, putting an arm around her. “I’m terrified and angry, but none of that will make Riley better. The only thing we can do is hold together, and keep trying to figure out what to do next.”

Jill bit her lip. As the idea in the back of her head from yesterday came out again with a vengeance. “Bill, I was thinking…” Bill looked down at his wife. She looked back up, an uneasy look on her face. “If Riley does come out of this, maybe we should have her move in with my mother for a while.”

Bill was surprised by the declaration. “What? You want to have Riley move again ?”

Jill stepped away from Bill so she could look him in the eyes straight on. “Look at what’s happened ever since we moved.” Bill didn’t immediately answer that, so she pressed on. “In the first three days from when we got here, she almost ran away back to Minnesota.”

Bill nodded in acknowledgment at that. “Yes, but that was because we didn’t communicate properly with her. And she learned to love this place. Especially once she got to decorate her room.”

“Then there was the broccoli incident.”

Bill shrugged. “Accidents happen. And Jordan did admit it was his fault.”

“And now all this? Riley’s supposed to be growing up normal, but all these abnormal things keep happening. It’s like she’s becoming troubled just from being here.”

Bill then crossed his arms. “And you think moving her again will be any better? After what happened the first time, wouldn’t being sent to small town Ohio just make it even worse?”

Jill looked away at that. Her husband had a very good point, but she wasn’t fully convinced yet. She took a deep breath. “I never thought parenting would be easy, but this is a nightmare. I don’t know why Riley started hearing voices or drawing such odd things. But whatever happened, it got to her. I won’t have my daughter fall apart before she even hits her teenage years, and if we need to try a new setting to clear her head, then maybe it’s for the best.” Bill looked a little offended at that, but then Jill hugged herself, and her expression became even more distressed. “And it’s been hard for me too, Bill. As nice as the neighbors and school parents are, it still doesn’t feel like I have the same close friends we had in Minnesota. If Riley recovers, maybe we all need another fresh start elsewhere.”

Bill’s expression softened immediately. He reached out again, taking one of Jill’s hands. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you felt that way.”

Jill looked at him. Her eyes filled with appreciation, but also fear. “Maybe if we had more support, I’d feel differently, but it’s so scary Bill. I love you, but we need to think about what’s best for Riley. I want her to recover, and after all the yelling and reports I heard from school and hockey this week, I don’t know if she’ll ever fit in around San Francisco again.”

Bill squeezed her hand. “It’s easy to jump to conclusions when we’re scared and tired, but-”

*Ding Dong*

The two stopped, and turned towards the front door. Bill hesitantly asked, “Are we expecting anyone?”

Jill shook her head. “No, but I think I know who it is.” She dropped her hand, making her way to the door with Bill right behind her. “And we’re not done with this conversation,” she warned her husband. Bill looked like he wanted to say something else, but kept it quiet for whatever was awaiting them.

Opening their door, it was exactly who Jill was expecting, but also way more. Ann was at the front door again, but alongside her was Jordan, and 3 of their parents.

“Whoa.”

Jill’s Disgust turned to look at her Fear. “You said it. We’ve never seen so many people at our door since Minnesota.”

Anger gave a light frown. “I hope they aren’t here to throw a pity party. We didn’t need any help.”

Joy however looked touched. “Look at them all. They showed up when we didn’t expect anyone else. Don’t you see ladies? We do have close friends around San Francisco.”

Sadness gave Joy a slight side eye. “I wouldn’t say they’re necessarily friends, Joy. Keep it polite, but we don’t have to accept or do anything until we have a better idea of what's going on.”

Jill responded first. “Ann? You brought…everyone with you?”

Mrs. Jones stepped up besides her daughter. “Well, not everyone. My husband is still on his shift at the hospital.”

Bill defensively crossed his arms behind Jill. Trying to support her while expressing his own feelings. “We didn’t want this to get out. Riley is our child, and we’ll manage fine without anyone else.”

However, Mrs. Adams stepped up next. “Hey,” she soothed. “No parent should go through something like this alone. I’m not here as a teacher, but as a parent like you both. We can’t change Riley, but we’re here for you all.”

Mr Adams then came up with some tupperware in hand. “We made a meal so you both don’t have to worry about cooking this weekend.”

And Mrs. Jones also brought up a bouquet she was carrying. “No lilies, I swear. These are for hope. And to brighten up your home when Riley comes back.” The Andersens looked ready to say something, but she cut them both off. “Riley WILL come out of this. She’s too strong to be brought down no matter what she’s been struggling with the last few days.” Then she looked down at Ann who was somewhere between screaming and begging in her eyes. “And when she does…she’ll have all her friends to make sure she knows just how loved and supported she always was.”

Jill felt the emotions she’d kept at bay finally start to leak out. All the stress and fear had already cracked her facade, but with this outpouring of kindness and optimism? It awoke something inside, and the loneliness she’d experienced began to dissipate from her heart. She held herself to Bill, trying to keep together. But Jill knew she’d lose her composure if nobody else said something.

Bill looked at his wife, then looked at the families on his porch. All of them with eyes of sympathy and pity. He swallowed, but also smiled, realizing an important truth. “ You were wrong Jill. We do have close friends around school. We just didn’t recognize them.” Outwardly, he gratefully said, “Thank you. Thank you all. This means a lot to us.” 

Seeing the distraught look on Jill’s face, Jordan’s mom looked at the kids. “Ann, Jordan, can you wait outside for a little while?” Seeing the protests on their lips, she held up a hand. “It’s boring parent stuff. Just, give us a few minutes.” The two kids sighed, but nodded. Leading the way, Bill and Jill brought the three other parents inside, and gently closed the door behind them.

Ann and Jordan took a seat on Riley’s steps. Jordan looked over at Ann. She still looked agitated, but substantially calmer since he saw her earlier in the day. He reached out a hand, and put it on top of Ann’s. She glanced to the side with a questioning look.

“Hey, you…okay now? You looked pretty upset earlier today, and when you disappeared after lunch, I got worried.”

Ann sighed. “Okay is when I see Riley all better.” Then she gestured her head back to the house. “You told YOUR mom about Riley?”

Jordan shrugged. “After you told me Riley was hospitalized, I felt like I needed advice on how to support her. And my mom is too smart. She figured out something was wrong with Riley thanks to reports from the other teachers and wanted some information from me.”

Ann grumbled, “Makes sense I guess. Though I wish it wasn’t true.” Ann then stared out at the street. “Did you see my fight with Tracy?”

Jordan shook his head. “I did hear rumors though. I heard you really scared Tracy. I heard one of the lockers got damaged. And something about violent threats?” Looking over at Ann, she had a slight glare on her face. Jordan raised up his hands in a placating gesture. “Just rumors.”

Ann bit her lip, but shook her head to get out of her mood. “I lost my temper, but I’m not sorry for what I did.”

Jordan didn’t respond to that, feeling the icy mood coming off his friend. Then he followed Ann’s gaze out over the street. “Some week, huh?”

Ann swallowed. “No. I’m going to stick to my promise. I’ve done enough crying,” she chided to herself. “I still don’t understand how this could happen.”

Jordan shrugged. “Life is always messy and mysterious. But what matters is that your band walks through it together.”

Ann looked over. “Where’d you hear that one?”

“Made it up just now.”

Ann finally smiled a little. “You bonehead. How’d I ever become friends with a doofus like you?”

Jordan gave a grin, but didn’t respond. Instead, he looked up at the 2nd floor of Riley’s home. “You know, we haven’t seen Riley’s room yet. Maybe we could do a sleepover once she’s better.”

Ann gave Jordan a deadpan look. “You WANT to do a sleepover? With two girls, who are your friends?”

Realizing the implications, Jordan immediately shook his head. “Uh…forget I said that. Maybe we can just get Riley to show us her room sometime on a weekend?”

Ann gave a small smirk. “That’s what I thought.” She then turned to look at the door. Pondering everything that happened this last week. “What are they going to do when Riley wakes up?”

Jordan had a look of unease as he thought about the question. “Who knows? At this point, it’s out of our hands.” He frowned sadly.

Ann tapped a finger, thinking about the last few days, before then looking back at Jordan. Trying to clear the bad memories away. “But no matter what, we’ll be there for her.”

Jordan nodded, his expression growing stronger. “Because true friends don’t give up on each other.”

Ann smiled hearing that phrase again. “It’s practically our catchphrase," she commented, which Jordan smiled at too. Then the front door opened up, and their parents came out.

Mr. Adams looked down at the two kids, who now were both standing, expectantly. He gave a little nod. “You two can visit Riley tomorrow afternoon.”

“Thank you dad,” Jordan quickly replied.

“Thank you,” Ann gratefully said. She took another calming breath, then took her mother’s hand. “Why don’t you come over to my house, and we’ll go together Jordan?”

Jordan gave a small smile. “Sounds like a plan.” The two families began walking off to their cars. Before turning away, Jordan gave Ann a wave. “See you tomorrow.”

Ann nodded, then moved back to her car seat. Her mom, after stepping into the driver's seat, quickly reached back to take her hand. “You okay Ann? I know it’s been a lot since I had to come pick you up.”

“Okay is Riley being all better.” Then Ann added, “But I’m doing better than earlier for sure.”

Mrs. Jones frowned, but nodded. “Just…try not to get into any fights next time.”

Ann snorted in disgust. “I can’t believe I was ever friends with Tracy. I bet she’s not even sorry about what she said!”

Tracy sat in her room, staring at her math homework. She was supposed to be getting it done so she could link up with the other cool girls for a get together tomorrow. However, her day at school rattled her badly. She hadn’t been sent home or anything, but the encounter in the hallway still haunted her thoughts and emotions.

She still didn’t fully understand why though. Why did she feel regret after Ann told her the truth? Was she…empathizing with Riley? Tracy tapped her pencil on the desk in frustration. Why on earth would she care about someone who stole one of her friends away? It didn’t make sense. Why were her feelings so messy? And why did she get a sinking feeling in her stomach when she thought about someone else she knew in the hospital? After all these years, she thought she was over that.

“Tracy?”

Tracy froze mid tap. It was her father. Why was he home early? He was NEVER home before 8 on weekdays.

“Tracy, can you come down here? We need to talk.”

Tracy almost felt like an alien in her own body as she began walking down the stairs. But reaching the ground floor, it was no joke. Her Papa was standing there, a look of disappointment on his face.

“Papa? What are-”

“I got a call from your principal today.”

Tracy immediately clammed up. “Ann started it!”

Her Papa folded his arms. “So you didn’t call your classmate Riley a Dangerous Crazy Freak?”

“So? It’s True!” He gave her a raised eyebrow. Tracy held her ground. “And why do you care? Nothing happened!”

Papa gave a small growl. “You getting slammed into a locker and me getting called isn’t nothing.”

“So you’re upset because I didn’t fight back?” Tracy accused.

He shook his head. “No.”

“Then why are you back now?” Tracy asked in slightly angry confusion.

Her papa’s expression softened. She raised an eyebrow at that. But then he got down on her level. Tracy hadn’t quite hit her growth spurts yet, so they were roughly on eye level. “I left work early because I was worried about you. And I realized I hadn’t kept my promise to your mama.”

Tracy flinched at that. Neither of them talked about Mama all that much anymore. “Well, I’m fine now. Are we done?”

He shook his head. “I’m worried about you Tracy. I thought you were fine, but after hearing about this, I’m concerned. Maybe you haven’t been honest with me lately.”

Tracy snorted. “What else is there to tell?”

Her Papa reached an arm out, putting it on her shoulder. “Why was Riley bothering you so much? I thought you didn’t care about her.”

“It’s nothing. No-”

“Tracy. You looked rattled after we ran into her at Pizza Planet. And I haven’t seen much of you these last 3 days. I just remember hearing you sounding unnerved when I checked on you Tuesday, and sounding positively terrified on Wednesday.” Tracy opened her mouth, but he tightened his grip. “Be honest. Why did Riley Andersen scare you so much this week?”

Tracy looked down. She didn’t want to say this, but her fear and anger finally compelled her to talk. “She’s sick! She…” Tracy looked back up. “She thinks her emotions are controlling her. I know that she thinks it because she keeps trying not to have us hear her talking to someone we can’t see. She’s schizophrenic! She’s erratic. She’s too dangerous to ever stay around our school.”

That got his attention. He gestured to the table, and they both took a seat. He leaned forward. “And this just started this week?”

“Yes.”

“And…you couldn’t just ignore her if you were so scared?”

“She’s a danger to me!”

Her Papa raised an eyebrow at that. “Did she ever hurt you?”

“She stole my friend!”

Papa shook his head. “That was almost a year ago, Tracy. That’s not relevant to this week.” Tracy opened her mouth, but her Papa asked again. “Did she ever hurt you?”

Tracy bit her lip. “No, but every time she talks about it, or looks at me, I get a scary feeling. Like somehow what she’s doing is wrong and dangerous. A-And she almost hit me on Wednesday.”

He nodded. That would be legitimate to be scared about. “And what about the last few days?” Tracy’s expression immediately changed. And her Papa immediately saw it. “Tracy? What did she do?”

Tracy swallowed, then confessed. “She didn’t do anything Papa. I just found out that Riley’s in the hospital now.”

“She is?” He now looked very confused. “For what?”

“I don’t know, but it sounded pretty serious. Ann told me that Riley could die.”

Her Papa was very surprised at that. Then he stood up. His expression was hard to read from Tracy’s perspective. “Tracy, there’s something I want you to do tomorrow. For me, for Ann and for yourself.”

Tracy was dumbfounded listening to what her Papa wanted, but given his conditions, there would be no disagreements until she got it done. Internally, her anger and disgust screamed in outrage, but there was no other way forward. Instead of meeting with her friends, Tracy would have to go deal with the consequences of her actions.

Chapter Text

Chapter 16: Abstraction Part I-High Emotions

“We’ll see you at Abstract Thought. Good luck. Over.” And with that, the walkies cut out.

Joy looked back at Fear, who’d joined them later. “How many memories are down here?”

“48. I think we might’ve lost one or two since we went unconscious.” Harry looked at the 2 memory orbs sitting on the ground, but Fear immediately stepped in front of the imaginary boyfriend. “No! These memories are too dangerous to use here!”

“What if Riley goes vegetative in the time it takes another memory to get here?” asked Harry insistently.

Fear nervously looked between the orbs, the threads, and Riley, who was watching the exchange with an intrigued expression. Fear took a deep breath, and then pointed at the cluster of black and grey threads still standing behind them. “We’re going to need to change these gloom filled beliefs eventually. That means we’ll need more than just these two memories. So we don’t have to use them now.”

“I agree.” Everyone turned to look at Riley, who made that declaration. “I already told Joy I don’t want to believe in such awful things.” Another snapping noise went off, as another of the gloomy beliefs disappeared out of site and another belief thread disappeared. The cavern rumbled again, causing some more rocks to fall down, blocking off a couple of the streams coming in. Fear and Joy both cringed at that declaration, even though Riley didn’t seem to notice. “And we should figure this out once we’re safe.” Riley then pointed out towards the edges of the pool, where they could see several small streams of water flowing down into the space. “Besides, they could be replaced from any of these streams, right?”

“We won’t be able to rebuild Headquarters until we have enough memories down here,” reminded Anger.

Joy replied, “Then that’s the first thing we do once we’re out of here. But for now, let’s put these memories away, and get going.” She picked the two orbs up, sliding them into the imaginary bag which she was carrying now. She then looked at Riley. “Are you sure you’ll be up to this?”

Riley looked back at Jr, who placed a big hand on her shoulder. Riley took a deep breath, and then nodded. “We have to get out of here. I’ll be okay.”

“And remind me how we’ll stop the troublemakers from collapsing the belief system but not get caught?” Fear asked.

Joy gave Fear a wane smile. “You’re going to hate it, but we’ll have to lead them on a chase.”

“I hate this.”

“Shut up. I’m not fond of sneaking around either.”

“Quiet you two! Do you want the trouble makers to hear us now?”

The six travelers all huddled together as they creeped away from one of the holes. They were at an odd angle to the troublemakers, but not out of sight. They watched as Spite and Loneliness both took a swing at the mountain. The whole thing shook.

“Harder! We’ll break through soon, and then I'll catch them,” cheered Narcissism.

“But keep your eyes peeled. Those emotions might try to escape out the back,” added Paranoia.

“Wow. She’s good,” admitted Fear.

Anger and Joy both rolled their eyes at that. The group didn’t say any more until they were a good distance from the central column. Keeping to the shadows and bushes all the while. They were about to reach the ruins of the old headquarters, when a small twig snapped.

Paranoia whipped its head around. And although the small emotions were already a good distance away, her eyes narrowed. “They’re escaping,” she proclaimed.

“What? We’ve been careful. There’s no way they-”

“Shut up Spite! Just, give me a second.” Paranoia stood still, the other 4 troublemakers waiting for her to speak. She had her eyes closed for a moment, then they flew open. “They ARE sneaking away! Follow me!” And Paranoia took off.

“Hey! I’m first! I’m always-”

“Not now Narcissism! Let’s go!”

Unfortunately for the troublemakers, the emotions heard them talking as the smaller beings climbed into the remains of headquarters. Though Fear opened his mouth, Anger waved them forward. “All part of the plan. We just need to get to my room.”

“How do we even know we’re in the part where your room is?” asked Fear as they scrambled up the sides.

Anger pointed to the broken balcony just to the right of where they entered. “Because I have eyes, nerd.”

Fear defensively crossed his arms. “I would’ve seen it.”

Looking to their left, they saw that the ramp upstairs had collapsed. However, Jr had his hands down low as they approached the balcony. “Who wants a boost?”

Joy raised her hands first, so Jr grabbed her, and raised her up to the balcony where she could climb over. She then reached her hand down, pulling up all the others as they came. Then she looked at Jr. “Jump!” Jr jumped, and Joy caught his trunk. Then she almost got pulled over, but Anger, Fear, Harry and Riley all grabbed her waist. And together, they all pulled Jr up over the railing.

Joy looked to their right at where the ramp would be. “Maybe we should have a second ramp the next time Headquarters gets an upgrade.”

Fear and Anger both shrugged. “It’s not like we’ll need to climb over in the future,” Fear pointed out.

Anger then led them into his room. Looking around, several of them couldn’t help but feel like they were someplace dangerous despite it being Anger’s space. There was a full gym set, and a fireplace next to a grill with propane tanks. And then the bed was a stiff looking mattress with only the thinnest of pillows and a sheet of metal for a blanket. 

“So…nice space,” Harry awkwardly said.

“Don’t talk down to me,” Anger snapped. Harry opened his mouth. “You know what I mean! When I’m not working, this is where I get out all my excess tension from the day. Punching bags, granite blocks, lighting things on fire. Anything I need to wind down.” Anger then gave a huge smile. “Now let’s get our frame, and fuel.”

Meanwhile, back near Imagination Land, Disgust looked at the 5 other emotions as they all looked up from the remaining walkies. Sadness and Embarrassment both had a lot of concern on their faces. Envy and Nostalgia nervously looked at each other. Only Ennui looked relatively calm, but even she glanced at the Advanced Console Operations manual with a semi-thoughtful look on her face.

Disgust wasn’t exempt from the sense of worry. She took a seat, trying to get her nerves and anxiety under control. Her internal fears were racing through her mind, until suddenly she felt something on her right hand. She looked over, and saw Envy looking up at her expectantly. Then she felt another hand, and she saw Sadness holding her other hand. Sadness gave her a small but determined nod. Disgust swallowed briefly, then with the help of the other two, got back to her feet.

“Okay everyone,” she declared. The other emotions all looked at her. “We have our plan, now we just need to do it. We didn’t get to discussing this, but is there any way to open Abstract Thought without letting out troublemakers?” Silence settled over them. “Sadness?” Disgust looked with surprise since Sadness didn’t speak up.

Sadness awkwardly rubbed her hands. “As much as I know about how to draw troublemakers out, I don’t remember anything about emergency protections. Not without Headquarters.”

Disgust sighed. “I suppose we’ll have to hope they’re all fast enough to get out first.” She looked out past Imagination Land again. “We should get going.”

The other emotions gave light murmurs of ascent, but Ennui raised a hand. “I’ll stay here in case the others need anything else.” Disgust opened her mouth, but Ennui turned her raised hand into a raised finger. “AND, to let Anxiety know where you are if she gets back.”

Disgust gave a little groan of annoyance, but nodded. “Fine. Let’s go, everyone!” And leading the motley pack, the emotions made a beeline for Abstract Thought. Meanwhile, Ennui returned to her chair, leaning back and typing on her phone, a look of satisfaction briefly passing over her face, before it became a look of worry once more. After all, even boredom is hard to maintain when your life is at stake.

Paranoia came upon the wrecked Headquarters, a smirk on her face. “Little fools. You really think you can escape something so much stronger and bigger than any of you?” She gave a quick glance back at the other large troublemakers coming in behind her. “Now give us Riley!”

“You want her?” A sound like something igniting went off. Then a louder sounding Anger shouted, “Then try and catch us!!”

All of a sudden, a rocket shot out from Anger’s room. A rocket composed of propane tanks, weights, a punching bag, wood, steel, concrete, and 6 small beings holding on for dear life. It zoomed out of the headquarters, flying in an arc over the forest, leaving the troublemakers gobsmacked for a few moments.

Narcissism spoke first, greed in her eyes. “I want it.”

Spite spat on the ground. “I want to break it!”

Loneliness looked down. “It looks like…what Jr and I played on.”

Paranoia meanwhile gave a frustrated growl. “Come on!” And they all began running after the rocket.

As the makeshift vehicle took flight, all 6 mind beings clung onto the rocket and each other as hard as they could. Although the ‘rocket’ was rickety going forward, there was a weight up front being used by Anger like a steering wheel who was grinning like a madman as they soared out.

“This is just like when I was riding on Bing Bong’s Rocket last year!” shouted Joy from the front. “Only…less singing! And faster!”

“IhatethisIhatethisIhatethisIhatethis. HOW LONG DO WE HAVE TO BE ON THIS CRAZY THING??” Fear yowled from the back.

“We have to get out of the forest! Then we’ll double back to Egopolis,” Anger reminded them. Then he glanced back to the middle. “Riley, how are you holding up?”

Riley held a hand on the floor of the rocket, a white hue shining from her hand through the whole structure. “This is exhausting! Why didn’t we just transform this into its own vehicle?” she complained.

Harry rubbed her shoulder as she said this, allowing her to relax a little, even as the imaginary boyfriend had a grimace on his face trying to hold onto the rocket too. “We thought about it, but we thought this would be easier than trying to create it all at once outside of Imagination Land. And that could be consciousness tampering,” he reminded her with a grimace. Riley scowled in frustration at that.

“We’re getting there. I can see the edge of the forest. Hang on Riley!” called Jr from beside Joy and Anger. Then he gave a little grin. “Anyone want to sing as we’re going? Who’s your friend who likes to play?” There was a moment of silence. “No?”

“Bing Bong, Bing Bong” finally added Joy, with a half smile on her face.

Then the two began singing together. “His rocket makes him shout hooray, Bing Bong, Bing-”

“NO!” Anger suddenly cut them off. “It’s…nice to have you here Jr…but I will turn this around if we sing that song!”

A more awkward silence settled over the rocket as it zoomed out of the forest, before swooping around huge towers of food. Seeing how they were in position, Joy leaned over the side to shout. “HEY! HUNGER! I need your help!” she called. 

The big trouble maker looked up from eating some Chow Mein. “Joy, what are-” Hunger’s confused response cut off suddenly as he looked past the small rocket approaching him to see the others coming. “Narcissism? Oh no. No no no Joy! I can’t-”

“If you don’t stop them, Riley will never get to try Butterscotch Ice Cream! She’s right here with me!”

“Riley?” Hunger looked over, seeing the pained face of Riley looking up at him with a pained expression. Then Hunger’s eyes narrowed. “She’s right here?”

Fear started making his way towards the front. “He’s not going to do it! We have to-”

“Not yet!” Harry shouted, blocking his way forward. “If Joy thinks this will work, it will work!”

Hunger remained still for a few more seconds, raising his hand up. The 6 travelers held their breath in fear. Then that hand curled into a fist. And Hunger turned to face the larger oncoming emotions. “FOR ICE CREAM! FOR JOY! AND FOR RILEY!” And next thing they knew, he rolled into a ball and charged at the pursuers.

“Turn now!” Fear called. And Anger banked, now turning the rocket back towards Egopolis, parallel to Hunger’s charge.

“Do you really think he’ll be able to hold them back?” Harry asked as Hunger blocked Paranoia and Narcissism between two ice cream cones.

“What matters is that we have time to get farther away,” Joy reminded. “Anger, get us to the Ivory Tower!”

Anger looked back, noticing how the propane tank had begun to sputter. “We’re running out of fuel! But we should make it. Hold on everyone!” He then called out, “Riley, can you give us a boost?”

Riley groaned, “It’s like my muscles are on fire!”

“Can you do it??”

“FINE!” Riley snarled. And the rocket lurched forward at even greater speed. All the passengers, even Riley, now screaming in fear as they zoomed through the tunnel between spaces.

As Disgust led the emotions past the remnants of french fry forest, they finally were back at the entrance to Imagination Land. And now, they were across from the pipe to Abstract Thought with only the train tracks in front of them.

“So, where exactly do we open it up?” Disgust asked.

Sadness pointed straight ahead to a wheel hatch. “That’s the crossing point.”

“Oh, remember when Sadness saved Joy and Bing Bong getting through there?” Nostalgia wistfully remarked as she began moving forward. Sadness turned her head in confusion at that. The other emotions joined her giving Nostalgia confused blinks. She then turned back with a little smile. “It might’ve been scary, but it was a big step forward in helping Joy to trust you,” Nostalgia said dreamily.

“But, how do you know about it?” asked Disgust as she bent down.

Nostalgia gave Disgust’s cheek a pinch. “Ditzy Disgust. If we can monitor upstairs from downstairs, what makes you think we didn’t know about the journey?” Disgust rubbed her cheek in annoyance at that, but didn’t respond. 

Sadness moved to the door, all the others behind her. Then she knocked on it once, twice, three times. “It still sounds hollow. That means it isn’t turned on.” Then she began tugging on the wheel, but the door didn’t budge. “Ooohhh!”

“What do you mean, ooohhh?” Envy asked in surprise. “Can’t you open it?”

Sadness looked back at the little emotion, worry on her face. “It’s stuck. I can’t get it.”

Disgust looked back at the obvious emotion to help with that. “Embarrassment?” The big pink emotion gave a little grimace, shrinking backwards. But Disgust took another step forward. “You’re the biggest and strongest of us all. You have to do this.” 

Embarrassment clearly blushed at that, reaching for his sweater pull cord. But seeing the insistent look on Disgust’s face, and then Sadness’s pleading look, Embarrassment then gave a little sigh, dropped the string and walked forward to the wheel. Putting both hands on it, he began to twist it. It was slow going, but eventually they began to hear a squeaking sound like the sound of a heavy door being unlocked.

Envy then asked, “Why is this sealed? I figured the doors would stay open to create a passage between Long Term and Imagination Land.”

Sadness pointed at the sign above the door. DANGER: KEEP OUT! "No one should ever pass through Abstract Thought normally. After Joy, Bing Bong and I went through, we almost were destroyed when they turned it on.” They watched as Embarrassment kept turning the squeaky wheel. “Honestly, Joy, Bing Bong and I were both lucky and unlucky. Abstract Thought usually can’t be climbed over or passed through unless you’re deeper into the mind.” Then she looked down in thought. “I don’t know why it’s sealed now. Bing Bong was able to open it pretty easily when we went through. Maybe…it was loose because something new needed to be understood?”

Disgust spoke up as she came in on the conversation. “That was a rough lunch. I think we abstracted Loneliness from it, even if you weren’t there Sadness.”

Finally, something gave way, and the door finally came ajar. Embarrassment kept pulling, though much easier now. Until it was wide open, and looking inside, they saw nothing but darkness beyond the light cast by their door being open.

“It must be closed on the other side,” Sadness commented.

“How will we know if they’re in the tube when it’s so dark?” Disgust asked.

But before Sadness could answer, a light came in from the other side, as the other vault door opened up. A voice called out, “Hey! Who’s opening up Abstract Thought from the Imagination side?”

“Who’s there?” Sadness called back, feeling a small amount of deja vu.

“Elissa!” Responded the voice. “I’m one of the mind workers in charge of running Abstract Thought! Can you come a little closer? I can’t see you. I promise not to turn it on for now.”

“Hey! You can’t talk to us like that!” called Disgust from behind Sadness. “We’re the emotions! If anything, YOU should come closer to us!”

“You’re a very rude Emotion. Why should-”

“Protocol 1999,” interrupted Sadness. It felt like a low blow saying that, but after what happened in the Vault, it seemed like the fastest way to get the mind workers to listen to them. 

After a pause, “Okay, okay.” came the annoyed voice of Elissa. “Let me turn on the emergency lights.” For half a second, there was a moment of quiet. Then suddenly, a few dull lightbulbs came out of the ceiling, and lit up the space. And from the other side, the emotions spotted a dull green mind worker with a frustrated look on her face, now coming in about halfway. “Now, what’s going on?”

Sadness moved towards the center, feeling a bit more comfortable since she could see a mind worker. “Didn’t Anxiety tell you about this? She was supposed to be telling all of Long Term that we’re in Protocol 1999 right now.”

Elissa shrugged. “Ronnie and I only just got a call to begin Omega protocols. We were sleeping before that.”

“What’s that?” came the voice of Envy, who joined Disgust at the entrance.

Elissa gestured behind herself. “Some of the mind workers in camp are being reassigned due to the uncertainty of everything. Omega Protocols are if we need to send Abstract Thought into the dump to preserve more of the mind.”

That set off alarms from all the emotions hearing that. “What???” Envy shrieked.

Elissa looked apologetic, but serious. “We’re running out of water to circulate the mind with the Stream of Consciousness going down. We need some of that to run Abstract Thought. This is something to help save water in an emergency situation.” A rumble then came through the whole structure, causing everyone to flinch. “And with the memory dump expanding, we may not have a choice since our supports aren’t exactly flexible.”

Disgust then came in close next to Sadness, coming right up to Elissa, her own face just as serious as she towered over the mind worker. “Well, we’re calling an override on that order right now! We’re so close to fixing everything again!”

Elissa crossed her arms. Stubbornly meeting Disgust’s eyes. “This isn’t just something we can ignore. If we have to get rid of Abstract Thought to better preserve the rest of the mind, those higher protocols aren’t going to matter.”

Disgust then dropped her bombshell. “Riley’s going to be coming back through this tube.”

Elissa gave a jump of surprise. “What?”

Sadness finally stepped up next to Disgust. “Her dream self is stuck in the Unconscious right now. Joy, Anger, Fear and a few others are getting her out through here.” Then Sadness added, “It’s part of mind manual 8, section 13. Troublemaker release should work in concept even with smaller beings like us. We need more time.”

Elissa took a moment to think, placing a hand on her chin. Then she gave a little nod. “I suppose you’re right. Those are occasions we got recent training for.” Then she narrowed her eyes. “But we can’t ignore the needs of the mind for much longer.” She then called over to the other side, “Ronnie! We have a potential special protocol 8 on the way. We’ll give them three hours, then we go to omega protocols.”

“Okay Elissa,” replied a voice back, as a slightly taller worker gave a thumbs up from the other side. “And you’re sure it’s special protocol 8?”

“Pretty sure.”

“Thanks. I’ll start adjusting the dials.”

Elissa gave the emotions one more look. “Three Hours. Then we bury this.” And she turned around and moved for the exit.

“How do you even know how long that will be if we’re not in Headquarters?” asked Disgust.

Elissa held up a pocket watch. “This isn’t our first rodeo, Greeny. Your time starts now.”

Disgust gave a little growl at that. Calling after her, “It’s Disgust, Elissa!” Then with a huff, Disgust walked back towards the door they came from. Sadness and Envy following behind.

Embarrassment and Nostalgia both gave sympathetic glances as the three stepped back outside. “Remember when-” Nostalgia began.

“JUST---Just don’t,” Disgust spat. She sat herself down next to the door, a sour look on her face.

Sadness sat down next to her, and Envy also stood nearby with the other secondary emotions, all with sympathetic eyes. Sadness looked over, and just said, “I know this is really hard.”

Disgust gave a little groan. “I hate this feeling.” She looked back over to Sadness. “I just figured out how we can talk to Riley, but now we may never get a chance.”

“Abstract thought is all metal on the outside. We’ll hear them when they get here,” Sadness reassured Disgust. Sadness then put a hand on hers. Disgust shot Sadness a dirty look, but Sadness met her gaze steadily. “We just have to hope they’ll get here in time.” Disgust looked away at that, but Sadness kept going. “Just like the hope Joy always gives us every day. The hope she gave me last year after the move.”

“Is that why she was such a control freak for the first 11 years? Hope that things were going well even when they weren’t?” Disgust snarked, not looking at Sadness.

Sadness shrugged sadly. “Nobody’s perfect.”

Disgust growled. “Well why shouldn’t we be? It’s…” She stopped herself mid rant, thinking about how imperfect Riley was of late, and the mistakes they all made trying to support her. Disgust turned to look at Sadness at last, who gave her a look that said 'Nobody's Perfect'  again with her eyes. Forced to concede on that point, Disgust sighed, then turned to look back inside Abstract Thought. “Well, they better get here in time, or there might not  be much of Riley left when we fix Headquarters.”

All the other emotions gave a solemn nod at that. Nobody moved. Just staring, and listening into the darkness. Hoping that their siblings, friends and their girl would come out at any moment.