"On a scale of 1 to 10, this day gets a 2," Disgust complained, fixated on her nails.
"At least that other student saved us from a horrible fate," Sadness mused. "The black girl with glasses, I mean."
The blue emotion looked down with regret. "Perhaps we should've tried to befriend her."
Anger glanced over his newspaper with the headline "NOT THE BEES!" and the sub-header "Stung by a bee! Ouch!"
"And how would we do that?" he questioned. "We all saw Friendship Island take the plunge this morning!"
Nobody had a clear answer to the red emotion, so the green one changed the subject. "In any case, Riley still has tryouts to get through. And Hockey Island's gonna fall apart if she tries to use it."
The melancholic emotion pressed her fingers together. "Her left hand got injured…it's her dominant one, too."
"Well, I'm gonna do something about this and recall whatever hockey memories I can find," the fierce emotion went up to the console, tapping several buttons. After several unsuccessful attempts that left him increasingly frustrated, he managed to bring up a red memory of Riley aggressively whacking the puck into the goal.
"That one's not happy," Disgust observed. "You really think this will work in place of the core memory?"
Anger narrowed his eyes at the fashionable emotion. "Don't you think I would've used one of the happy memories instead if I could actually find one of them?"
As he was asking her this, he approached the core memory holder and opened it up. Upon viewing the remaining core memory, he recoiled from surprise.
"What in the blazes happened here?!" he shouted.
Sadness and Disgust gathered around Anger to see what had him so worked up, and they gasped upon seeing what he saw.
The once purely golden core memory that powered Honesty Island was now radiating a half-gold, half-lavender glow.
—
Riley and her mom arrived at the ice hockey rink for tryouts, the former getting dressed in her hockey gear with her jersey, pants, helmet, and ice skates.
"This should be fun," Mom encouraged. "New team, new friends…they're from San Francisco, so they must be pretty good!"
"Andersen, you're up!" the coach announced over the operating system.
"Let's get this over with," Riley muttered as she grabbed her hockey stick and stepped onto the ice rink.
"Good luck, sweetie!" Mom called out.
"We can discuss the state of Honesty's core memory later," Disgust urged. "Get the hockey memory in there. She's about to play."
Anger loaded the red memory into the core memory holder, and Hockey Island began to light up in a red hue.
"See? It's working!" the hotheaded emotion gestured towards the aforementioned island.
As the hockey coach called out for the players to do line changes, Riley forcefully dribbled the puck back and forth, having to extend herself further with each step. She felt the back of her left hand ache, but pushed herself through the pain. Sadness watched uneasily, wondering if they were pushing Riley too hard by continuing with the tryouts.
Her thoughts were proven true when the core memory holder opened itself up and ejected the red memory, hitting Anger right in the face. Riley began to struggle to keep her balance on the ice while the coach demanded for everyone to pick it up, and she ended up losing control over the puck. Irritated, he shoved the red memory right back into the holder, pressing his fist against it.
An Asian girl took control of the puck, dribbling it carefully as she made her way to the goal. A surge of annoyance coursed through Riley, and she skated rapidly towards the Asian girl. Determined to be the one who scored, the blond girl took one, hard swing at the puck.
The red memory smacked Anger's fist back hard as it was rejected again, knocking him flat on his back. Right afterwards, Riley missed the puck, tripping and falling onto the ice. The Asian girl, shocked and unable to stop herself, ended up tripping over the blond girl, collapsing right onto her.
"Are you okay?" one of the teammates asked, skating up to them.
"I…I'm fine," the Asian girl replied, not feeling particularly injured due to her fall being broken by the other player.
"Andersen! Penalty box, two minutes!" the coach declared.
"Penalty already?!" Anger fumed, righting himself back up. "That's it!"
He was about to storm up to the console when Sadness tugged on his arm. "Anger…don't."
"Geez, now everyone's gonna look down at us," Disgust facepalmed herself. "I'm so done with this."
The green emotion, frustrated and upset at their failure, strolled towards the console while the blue one was stuck holding the enraged creature back.
"Disgust, wait! If we just wait out the penalty and apologize to the other girl…" Sadness hastily called out.
"And make a complete fool out of ourselves? Nope," the fashionable emotion shut the bespectacled one down as she tugged on the levers.
Riley grabbed her stick, dragged herself up, and skated towards the exit, leaving the rest of the players behind.
"Riley, what's wrong?" Mom asked with concern.
"We need to leave," Riley grunted, yanking her ice skates off.
"It's just a minor penalty," Mom tried to reassure her. "You can still finish tryouts afterwards, right?"
"No. Not like this," the kid bitterly seethed, forcing her shoes on her feet.
"Hey, it'll be alright. Let's just go back–" her mom tried to suggest.
"I said no, Mom!" Riley snapped, gripping her hockey bag and stomping away from the ice rink.
Sadness, feeling tears welling up in her eyes, let go of Anger and waddled up to the console.
"This is so sad," she hitched, her voice shaky. "Can I even salvage this miserable day?"
She pressed the main button, creating a faint blue hue, and Riley felt her vision turn blurry as she looked back over her shoulder, her eyes landing on the Asian girl back on the rink. The Asian girl skated towards the outer ring, looking back at her with a hint of…sympathy?
The blond girl rapidly blinked her eyes, trying to swallow her guilt over the incident and turning to walk out of the building.
Inside HQ, the blue glow on the console abruptly cut out. Sadness froze, shocked from what had just happened. She continued to tap on the buttons and even pulled the levers, but there was no reaction, no color, just nothing. The shock gave way to dread as the blue emotion realized what this could mean for her, and more importantly, for Riley.
"Riley…doesn't want me around?"
—
While the trio strolled through Preschool Land, a creaking sound pierced the relaxed atmosphere. Their heads turned to see Hockey Island taking the plunge into the abyss of the Memory Dump.
"Hockey?!" Joy exclaimed, bringing its core memory out. "No…that's her favorite sport! She can't just give up hockey!"
Fear was about to scurry off to hide behind the castle, but stiffened upon seeing the state of the island right behind it. "Do you guys see Honesty Island? Something's wrong with it!"
Everyone noticed that the island in question had changed colors, resulting in a half-gold, half-purple glow. The general structure of the purple half of the island looked crooked, while the golden half remained in pristine condition.
"What?" Joy gasped. "How could…"
She shook her head, putting the core memory back in the bag.
"Gah, we're running out of time!" the yellow emotion urged. "Bing Bong, where is the train station?"
"It should be right over–" Bing Bong stopped when he noticed several structures in Preschool Land either missing, being demolished, or torn apart. Beyond the giant teddy bear's decapitated head was the rocket wagon he had been searching for, but it was being carried away by two Mind Workers.
"My rocket! Riley and I were gonna fly to the moon with it!" the imaginary friend cried out, chasing after the workers while singing out his theme song. The rocket briefly started up, only to shut down just as quickly as the workers threw the rocket onto a pile of old memories. A bulldozer rolled in, pushing the memories and the rocket towards the edge of the Memory Dump.
"NOOOOO! Not the dump! Anywhere but the dump!" he yelled, running right in front of the bulldozer. His leg proceeded to seize up, resulting in the imaginary friend collapsing on the floor. He was paralyzed from the sheer pain of his leg cramp, unable to move himself out of the bulldozer's path.
"Get out of the way, Bing Bong!" Fear cried out. A part of him wanted him to go after the imaginary friend, but his nerves shackled him to where he was, unable to suppress his self-preservation instinct.
"I CAN'T!" Bing Bong exclaimed, squinting in agony as the vehicle continued to proceed, undeterred. "My leg's acting up!"
"Don't just stand there, Fear!" Joy shouted, desperately dashing towards the pink elephant.
With just a few seconds to spare, she launched himself towards Bing Bong, tackling him and sending them rolling away from the bulldozer. The purple emotion gasped in short breaths, as all he could do was watch the vehicle forcing the rocket wagon and the rest of the memories off the edge and into the Memory Dump. The other two companions fell to the ground, the yellow emotion dazed from the impact, while the imaginary friend jumped to his feet, his leg cramp having passed. He peered into the black abyss, but couldn't catch sight of his beloved rocket, no matter where he looked.
"My rocket…Riley can't be done with me! She can't!" he exclaimed, shaking his head wildly.
Joy shook off the dazed feeling and scrambled towards the fluffy elephant, determined to continue on with their journey.
"That's not true!" she objected. "We can fix this. Just calm down and tell us where the train station is."
"How am I supposed to calm down?!" Bing Bong snapped. "I had a whole trip planned for both of us, and it's over, just like that? It's not fair."
The yellow emotion watched him continue to sulk, trying to think of a way to get through to him. "Hey, who's ticklish? Here comes the tickle monster!" she held her hands up and wiggled her fingers on his fur.
The pink elephant didn't spare her a glance, so she got in his face and stretched her mouth with her hands while tilting her pupils. When that proved to be ineffective as well, Fear approached them, tapping on Joy's shoulder.
"Not now, Fear," she whispered urgently. "We gotta get to the train station before it's too late!"
The nervous emotion stiffened, but found it in himself to not back down, wanting to make up for his cowardice moments ago. "Just let me try. Please."
Joy gave him a disapproving look, but she conceded, walking off to leave the two male creatures with each other. A moment of silence followed as Fear tried to think of the best thing he could say to make the imaginary friend feel better. Being who he was, he knew he wasn't exactly the most socially skilled one around, but he had to at least give it a shot.
"Hey…I just want to say, I'm sorry that your rocket's gone," the nervous emotion spoke up.
"It was all I had left of Riley. I would do anything to take her to the moon," Bing Bong confessed.
Fear nodded along. "What were your adventures like with Riley?"
"Simply wonderful. There was this one day where we flew back in time and had breakfast twice," Bing Bong reminisced.
"That sounds pretty crazy," the purple emotion commented. "I don't know if I could ever go on an adventure like that."
"The things Riley and I used to do…anything could happen. But now…there's nothing left for me anymore," the imaginary friend hunched over, upset.
"It's scary, isn't it?"
"Huh?"
"Losing something or someone that you loved," the nervous emotion answered. "One moment, they're right by your side, and the next thing you know, they're just…gone."
They sat together quietly while Joy looked down with an unreadable expression, facing away from them.
"I'm scared, too. Scared of losing you or Joy to the Memory Dump, or whatever else is out here. Most of all, I'm scared of being forgotten," Fear admitted. "That's why I couldn't bring myself to jump in the bulldozer's path. Or entering that dangerous chamber for that matter. I wish I was able to save your rocket, but…"
The purple emotion stopped himself, taking a breath. Now probably wasn't the time for self-deprivation. He looked down at the Memory Dump, bringing his arms to his chest, then turned back to his companion.
"I guess…if there's one thing that I've always told myself, it's that I want all of us to live to see the next day. And Joy wants you to live, too. I think that's why she jumped in to save you," the purple emotion spoke up.
Bing Bong felt candy welling up in his vision. "You guys…"
Fear slowly reached his arm around the imaginary friend's back, thinking it would be the best thing he could do to comfort him. He felt the pink elephant's head rest on his shoulder as pieces of candy fell from the latter's eyes. The purple emotion jolted up reflexively from the contact, but willed himself to keep his nerves steady.
Once the stream of candy stopped, Joy began to make her way back to her companions. "Feeling better, now?"
"Yeah, I'm good," Bing Bong nodded, giving Joy a light smile. "Thanks for saving me from getting dumped."
Joy returned his smile with her own as he stood straight up and proceeded to head northwest.
"The train station is over there," the imaginary friend indicated.
While Bing Bong was ahead of the others, Joy looked at Fear meaningfully.
"I know you must be disappointed in me, and I'm sorry, but…I just couldn't risk falling into the dump!" the stressed out emotion insisted.
"That's not…" Joy started before giving him a smile. "I don't know how you did it, but you managed to get Bing Bong back on track, no pun intended. Good job, Fear."
"Oh, well…" Fear briefly averted his eyes. "I tried to listen to him, even though I'm not as good as–"
"There it is!" Bing Bong announced. "The train!"
The three companions all climbed aboard, and soon, the train began to take off.
"And here we are!" Joy cheered, twirling on the cart. "We'll be home at last!"
Fear smiled at seeing the yellow emotion spinning around gleefully. Then she crashed into two boxes, one labeled "Facts" and the other "Opinions", and he shrank back against the inner wall as several tiles flew out onto the floor.
"Oh no…we can't tell these Facts apart from the Opinions!" Joy lamented.
The purple emotion crouched down, trying to investigate the fine print on the tiles, only for Bing Bong to gather them all up and drop them into the "Facts" box.
"Eh, no need to worry. It happens all the time."
—
Riley stormed into her room, dropped her hockey bag onto the ground, and collapsed into her sleeping bag.
"It's official: this day gets an F now," Disgust grumbled.
"Then why don't we stop sitting around and do something?" Anger demanded, kicking his seat over.
"Like what, dude?" the green emotion rolled her eyes.
The impatient emotion went quiet, conjuring up an idea on what he could do to resolve the issue of the missing core memories. Then a light bulb lit up in his head.
"Like the best idea ever!" he snapped his fingers, fishing out a cone-shaped Idea Bulb from the storage. "Riley's core memories were all made in Minnesota, so we go back there to remake the rest of them!"
Sadness stared at him wide-eyed, appalled at his suggestion. "So…you want us to run away?"
"We're not running away, we're undertaking the 'Happy Core Memory Development Program'," Anger insisted.
"That's not–"
"Hey, our life was perfect until Mom and Dad made us move to San Franstinktown!"
"It won't–"
"We gave up our room, backyard, and friends for this garbage life! And I say we take it all back!"
"You can't–"
He tried to bring up those memories of Minnesota, but was met with the Tripledent Gum commercial instead.
"Oh for crying out loud, GO AWAY, YOU STUPID COMMERCIAL!" he hollered, slamming his fist against the console to shut the jingle off. "The point is, our life was better back there."
Disgust tapped her foot, considering his plan. "Riley was happier back in Minnesota…"
"It's not gonna work, Anger!" Sadness blurted out. "Don't you remember that our parents sold off our old house?"
The hotheaded emotion stared at the sad one, trying to think of a rebuttal to her point. "Well…"
"And they won't be there with us if we go back all on our own!"
"It's their fault that–"
"Just stop and think! We can't be happy if we're forever alone like that!" the blue emotion protested.
Anger clenched his fists, frustrated at her counterarguments, yet even more frustrated at himself. A tense silence followed between the group before the aggravated emotion chucked the idea bulb as hard as he could on the ground, smashing it into a myriad number of pieces.
"Okay, FINE! You're right, this idea was stupid!" he bellowed.
"Which puts us back at square one," Disgust bemoaned before letting out a yawn. "I just wanna go to sleep and forget this day ever happened…"
The bespectacled emotion let out a sigh of relief before asking, "Who's going to handle Dream Duty then?"
"Why are you asking us that?" Disgust wondered. "You and Joy are the ones who have always done this, and since she's not around…"
"Besides, you're better at this than beanpole ever was," Anger added. "All he'd ever do was give us a rude awakening."
Sadness saw the expectant look on their faces and tilted her head down.
"Ohhh…normally, I'd be fine doing Dream Duty. But the console wasn't responding to me earlier, and that's never happened before. What if I can't wake her up if I need to?" she stressed.
"That's a good point," the green emotion acknowledged.
"Well, I don't wanna be the one on duty," the grumpy one crossed his arms. "All they do is send in the most cliche plot beats."
"I need my beauty sleep, so I really don't want to do it," the tired one rubbed her face.
"Then we have no other choice," Anger huffed. "Broccolady! You and me, rock, paper, scissors!"
"I told you to stop calling me that," Disgust gritted her teeth as she held out her palm while the melancholic emotion fetched a sweeper and a tray.
"Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!"
Anger held his palm out, while Disgust formed a sideways peace sign. Sadness gathered the broken base and shards and dumped them into a trash can.
"Looks like you're taking the night shift," the victorious creature smirked.
"Hmph…the one time I don't go for the fist and I still lose," the grouchy emotion grumbled, pulling up the seat he knocked over as Sadness and Disgust headed off to bed.
"There's gotta be a better idea I can think of…" he muttered to himself as the sky outside darkened.
A/N: Just like with the previous chapter, Grace is here early as well! Also, the ramifications of Fear touching Honesty Island's core memory are beginning to manifest. And Sadness is doing her best to manage things in HQ, but something's directly interfering with her…