Joy after the aftermath of Disgust's own voiced resentments had descended down into the deepest parts of Headquarters. Without caring about looking back or defending herself more as to heart, what Disgust had said was mostly true.

She had been a person who liked to hold only happiness ahead of anything else, as the concept of Riley to her now and then was driven by her.

The cost of her own rejection of anything that wasn't delight, jubilation or delight just didn't have a place here in the mindscape.

So was she actually trying to change?

For better or worse, it seemed that who Riley was had to be decided by Riley herself without her controlling it. At that cost Anxiety and herself both had done similar mistakes.

So it seems opposites yet so much the same, this held true for Joy as well as Anxiety. The same in terms of wanting to protect Riley that it almost broke the girl. Was this was what it was like growing up?

To Joy the atmosphere within the lower parts of Headquarters were dimly lit, as the only light here was her own golden glow. The oddity of dust and disuse folded out all around her as she finally stopped running.

She needed to just stop trying to run.

Joy you need to think, I can make Disgust see that she's wrong here! That's right! I'm right, and she's wrong!

That thought not unheeded stood in front of the underlying ones that Joy urged to stop struggling so loud, so intrusive. But she was more engaged with being in the right, even as her bare feet stood in the now lonely storage areas. It was mostly a series of doors that all were either locked up tightly or filled to the brim with junk and debris.

The hallway too was trashed with huge amounts of tilting boxes, cow-web filled files and so many books they all spilled along the pavement. Joy hated being anywhere near the storage area, as for everything a lot of their own problems and lost mind manuals were now scattered down here.

Why did she come all the way down here in the first place?

Well simple, it was…

It was where a lot of past information was placed either by her, Anger and the last emotion to have been down here Disgust.

But for joy the only door that held any of her attention right now was the dark midnight blue one at the end of the hall. Even if that door reminded her of a lot of horror movie tropes that Riley had recently gotten into. This door labeled in big black bold letters read aloud, 'Reminiscence'.

That word, as all of the other doors, all of which were a rainbow of colors, weren't marked the same as this one. But it was where she felt the most drawn too, almost an unnerved sense parted through her golden body.

One hand lingered over the dainty engraved silver knob as Joy thrusted it open even as the old door squeaked horribly as she stepped in. It too was dark, almost grey and without any sense of color despite the small faint bits of her light tangled in the inky blackness.

But again the word, 'reminiscent' came into her mind, almost like an unanswered question, one that needed to be realized.

Joy without looking flicked on the single dusty light switch, orange flared around her almost blinding her with its essence. Joy stifled a sigh and saw barely in the brightness a figure standing, reaching up behind her.

She jumped, reminding herself of her friend Fear but then saw the big, round glasses over two concerned glossy blue eyes.

"Joy why are you down here?!" Sadness asked, her trembling voice discerning throughout the hall, and back echoing toward Joy. Sadness slid over, closing the door a crack and peered at Joy but with an odd narrowed brow.

"Did you come down here for old recalled dreams?" She softly spoke, as her little blue hand went to touch Joy's own. The calmness of her voice though was unheard by the distracted leader, as Joy say a lot of old ideas.

So many old idea bulbs, many old dusted over memory orbs that were left down here instead of being dealt with or properly taken to the Short or Long Term Memory. She noted a lot of them were green, purple, faded bits of blue and ones of red.

"Joy?!" Sadness said, staring at all of these rejected old memories littered around their feet.

Before Joy had made the new latest means of getting rid of the more 'unneeded' memories to the back of Riley's mind, she had hid them all down here. There were perhaps hundreds, if not thousands, and she wondered if Disgust had found them all.

Though before this very room wasn't labeled with that word, why that word of all things?

Had Disgust been down here and saw all the hidden, forgotten and fragmented old memories, and noticed that none of them were gold colored.

I messed up.

"Joy, please say something?"

She was right about me.

"Joy!"

She was right I just couldn't see that. I was blinded by my own want.

"JOY!"

Joy paled, staring down towards the now crimson faced blue emotion, which held up both of her arms as if to ward Joy off her spiral. She could clearly see that Sadness was looking at her and back to the piles of tossed away memories, her face reminiscent to Anger.

"I'm sorry" Joy said, nestled one hand into her starburst dress as she felt again the unwanted prickle of tears dance down her face, "I'm truly sorry Sadness"

Sadness without much hesitation just moved up to Joy's side, one blue hand over yellow. One mere minute and then three more into a descent of a new understanding.

She wasn't very different from the newer ball of worry and stressful interactions, though the similarities were on control, containment and self-interest. Joy had held Riley and what that meant in her own tightly warped grasp for much of the young girl's life.

That control leered into keeping out Sadness and making her feel useless, small and now…leaving Joy wondering why she was here by her now.

Empathy.

It all came down to why each of them were here and needed. Even the more intense parts of all nine of them. It all came down to needing all of the bad and good, all of the light and dark and even the hard ingrained truths.

Joy once again stood up and took Sadness's other hand, "I need to apologize to everybody. Starting with you"

Sadness only looked back up calmly at Joy's now tear streaked face, "I forgive you".

Then without another word they went back up together, hand in hand.