Chapter Text
After an eventful summer camp experience, Riley returns home, having overcome yet another life-changing experience. The dinner she shared with her parents was simple, peaceful, and comfortably quiet — thankfully they did not ask too many questions about the previous days; she wouldn’t have known how to begin unpacking the whole experience. Night falls and all family members go to bed, though not all are asleep. Entering Riley’s mind, we see her emotions all gathered around the rogue sense-of-self Anxiety had created.
“So…what are we going to do with that thing?” Disgust says, putting an end to the awkward silence in the room.
“I-I don’t know. I thought it would just disappear after a while, you know? Not being rooted into anything and all,” Anxiety comments.
Fear walks forward to poke it, and the tree cries out, “Not good enough!”. Anger, having had enough of this pointless situation, grabs the sense-of-self and walks away with it.
“Wait, wait, Anger, what are you doing?” Joy asks, taking quick steps to catch up with him.
“Making it somebody else’s problem.” He crushes the glowing tree into a smaller shape and shoves it into the memory ejection system.
“Anger, don’t! We agreed we wouldn’t use that anymore!” Sadness says while reaching out her hand towards him, hoping he would at least consider her words.
“Whoops!” Anger shouts while ejecting the sense-of-self.
All emotions look out the window, witnessing the glowing object fly to the back of the mind like a shooting star. Anxiety pulls her hair back and stares at the sight in shock.
“No no no…We don’t know how that thing works outside of headquarters! What if it grows roots…What if it spreads like a weed?! We have to go get it now—”. Before Anxiety could proceed, Ennui tapped her on the head with her phone.
“Anxiety, calm down. We can tell someone else to go check on to make sure it doesn’t get worse. It’s not that big of a deal.”
“Yea…Maybe not…Ok, let’s do that.” Anxiety mumbled while loosening her grip on her hair.
Far out in the distance, the glowing tree lands on the back of the mind, rolling down a vacant hill, approaching a land filled with cracks on the ground. It slowly approaches the edge of a chasm, threatening to fall in, until it finally does with the aid of a gentle breeze. It falls down to the subconscious mind, crashing down on hard soil. There is no hint of life, nor of light. All that remains is the dim light of the orange tree. A normal plant could never survive in such conditions, but this wasn’t a plant that thrived in prosperous conditions. This was a product of despair and rejection.
The sense-of-self started digging its roots into the dead soil, in small, but persistent jolts, and the surrounding ground began glowing, a faint, sickening, orange.
