This is me answering a challenge issued by fellow author, Starnerve. Basically, you take an 'Inside Out' pairing and create 26 drabbles, each titled a single word, in alphabetical order. But you can't use the same words Starnerve used.

So because Sadness is a precious cinnamon roll who can do no wrong, and because I think she goes great with everybody, I decided to make this alphabet story use every possible pairing with the little blue munchkin. Besides, who doesn't want Sadness? She's cute and tiny, and smells like depression and boysenberries. Some of these will be goofy, others serious, some hot, some not. Enjoy!

A - Anger

Sadness liked Dream Duty, not because it was fun (it was quite the miserable and tedious exercise actually), but because it was the one thing Joy let her do.

Unfortunately, static dominated the giant monitor and filled the quiet of Headquarters with a constant white noise: "FFFFFFFFF-", it went. Dream Productions must be having connection issues again. Just my luck of course.

Sadness's mouth twisted. She bit the inside of her lip. She tapped her fingers together. Nothing came through on the monitor. Sighing grievously, the Emotion pushed herself on the couch and shuffled her way towards the back of the room where the kitchen door was.

Pushing through the door, Sadness almost bumped into Anger.

"Oh, hey kid," he grumbled, tired eyes peering over the edge of a glass of water. Sadness could only stare at him, her mouth opening and closing with no words coming out. Her chest tightened as she came to a terrifying realization:

She was alone with Anger. Volatile, explosive, destructive, ANGER.

"Um," she mumbled, taking a step back. Every instinct in Sadness's body told her to run, but, well, she was never much of a walker to start.

Anger, with his silly little brown nightcap, white tank top and sleeping shorts, downed the rest of his drink quickly before giving her a puzzled look. "Kid, what's wrong with you?"

"N-Nothing..." Sadness kept taking glances at the top of his head, trying to find the telltale signs of those glowering fractures breaking open atop Anger's head. "I was just...minding my own business."

Anger blinked slowly. "Alright kid, spill the beans. What's eating you?" He gestured with his hands in a "come over here" motion, but that only seemed to push Sadness further away. Anger held his hands out. "Kid, what's your deal? You look like you've seen a ghost!"

Sadness shook to the harshness of his gravelly voice. She swore steam was beginning to rise above the red brick's head, and suddenly her mind filled with all those images of Fear flying back into the wall from one of Anger's mighty punches, his head engulfed in flame, raging and screaming as he who summoned it.

And she was all alone with him.

It took every particle in her construct to summon the voice to speak. "I'm fine," she mumbled, sinking into the collar of her sweater. "Please, I-I wasn't looking for anything, I'm okay. You're fine, there's nothing wrong. It-It's Dream Productions, the-the movie, it won't play and I got tired and, and I..."

"Wait," Anger threw up his hands, and Sadness froze at both the gesture and bluntness of his tone. "Wait," he said, a little more gently. "Kid, you're not...afraid of me, are you?" His eyes narrowed inquisitively.

But Sadness knew heartache better than anyone, and she could hear past the gruffness of Anger's tone and sense how hurt he was at the realization. Suddenly, as was the teardrop's nature, she felt bad for inflicting emotional pain on Anger, however much of a brick he might be. Ashamed, Sadness could only offer her typical somber gaze.

Anger understood, and he cupped his face and let out a long, gruff sigh. "Great, that's just great," he muttered to himself, looking every which way but directly at Sadness. When his gaze finally did return to her, Anger's lips pursed, and for the longest time it felt like that was all they did: stared. Sadness's instincts told her to run, but whatever force held her refused to let her move a muscle.

"Kid, look." Anger's eyes were on the floor between her slippered feet. "I...You...don't have anything to be afraid of, okay?"

Sadness understood, but she couldn't figure out what to say in reply; Anger took her prolonged silence as one.

"I mean, ugh!" Anger's fists shook. "What I'm trying to say is..." He finally looked up, and from there his eyes were the only soft thing about him. "You don't need to be afraid of me. Now, I understand why that could be a bit hard, believe me, but...I won't ever hurt you guys, you hear me?"

By complete kneejerk reaction, and immediately regretting it the moment she said it too, Sadness blurted out, "What about Fear?"

Anger's mouth hung open, processing that Sadness both spoke so unexpectedly and that she mentioned Fear. Then his face sulked into a grimace. "Oh, that beanpole? Come on, kid. Fear's a complete sponge and we both know it. Besides, you know how it is with us guys, we roughhouse. It's like...hockey!" He wore a grin, but its effect failed to lift Sadness's spirits and Anger quickly abandoned it.

He sighed again. "I'm not good at this empathy stuff, kid. Just...trust me, alright? I'm never going to hurt you, or Joy or Disgust, or even Fear. Much." He snickered a little, but his face quickly turned serious again. "I'm not going to hurt you, you hear me, Sadness?"

The mention of her name made Sadness lift her face, eyes wide and curious.

Anger seemed to notice this, and though he maintained a serious demeanor it didn't fool Sadness; she caught him smirking ever so slightly before resuming.

"In fact, I'm going to make sure I keep you all safe. From what, I don't know. A rampant nightmare or Disgust having a bad hair day," he chortled at his own bad joke, "whatever it is. There's nothing to be afraid of while I'm still kicking and screaming. No son of a gun is laying a hand on anybody, especially you. "

Sadness's breath hitched in her throat, and instantly she plunged nose-deep into her sweater, trying to hide the flattery raging across her face. "'Especially me'?" she echoed, mumbling.

Anger's eyes widened and he sputtered out a few words, as if caught off guard by his own words himself. Sadness could swear she saw a big of pink in his red face. Then Anger said nothing more, outside of a sort of grunt in the back of his throat.

With a nod, Anger averted his eyes and muttered, "'Night, kid," before exiting the kitchen threshold and striding past her.

Another one of those pesky kneejerk reactions took hold of Sadness just then, and as the shorter Emotion waddled by she leaned forward and pecked him on the cheek.

A rush of both fear and a soaring heart took off inside her as she pulled away, and watched as Anger gently put a hand to where she kissed, grabbed at it slightly, and then dropped his hand, all without looking back. That, however, she did not mind one bit.

All's that mattered, was that there was not a glowing fracture in sight against the blackness of Headquarters.

That was fun. Up next is B - Break-ups

Who's the pairing this time?