First thing that Sam did once there was no company to entertain, was turn off all the lights in the room, leaving only the small one above the bed to show him the way around. Second thing was to take his second shower of the day. Once he was standing naked before the shower, he realized that he was also standing before a crossroads of sorts. But the decision came quickly. After all, Sam wasn’t at home. Half a minute later, he stepped into the shower with the sound of the toilet flushing in his ears.

Fortunately, the waters proved just as warm as they had been before, so Sam opted, unconsciously, to stay in the shower long enough to get his new skin proper pruned. But he was eventually forced to leave the cognitive safety of the shower due to the lack of knowledge about whether water remained a precious resource, even in a world with magic. It was only after he donned the bathrobe that he realized that he forgot one habitual aspect of his nightly cleaning routine. But it seemed that he wasn’t the only one who forgot about dental hygiene since the appropriate tools were nowhere to be found.

Sure, he could step out into the hallway, back into this strange and foreign world, and quest for a toothbrush and paste. Surely this modern hospital was not so different from the ones he was familiar with as to not have a nurse’s station somewhere on every floor. Still, he decided that his dental health could take a small hit from a missed brushing. The potential damage to his already fragile mental health was much greater.

Walking back into the dimly lit room, Sam was at a loss at what came next. Of course, it was rare, bordering on impossible, for a person to have nothing they could do. And indeed, Sam could think up a dozen different things to occupy his time. However, he couldn’t think of any one thing that he should do. For once in his life, there was no drive in him to reach some arbitrary goal, no anxiety constantly reminding him of his multitude of responsibilities. After all, there was nothing left of the life he had built for himself except for that very self. And even that was in question.

Sam shook his head. He shouldn’t wallow in self pity. Or at the very least, he should try not to. He eventually settled on talking a sit next to the bed and propping his legs on it, trying to slip into the habit of his daily post-shower mediation. Still no timer, of course, but that didn’t bother him. He wouldn’t have known for how long to set it to anyway. Going old-school, he started with one for breathing in and two for out, and all over again once you reach ten. But only completed a couple of rotations before deciding to drop the counting. The breathing came easily to him; steady and measured. With it being so calm, it was almost too easy to sink down to its constant rhythm.

The thoughts, however, were a different story, much more distracting than usual (a great feat, that). They came in rushing waves, each from a different direction, each trying to turn his mental gaze towards it. He did an admirable job of avoiding getting lost in them, much better than he ought to have been able to. He didn’t know whether to credit that to his new body and the effect of magic with their miraculous ability to dissipate his negative feelings. Or whether the reason that no one thought was able to take hold in his head was that the competition between them was so fierce.

Eventually, he had enough. He didn’t know how long he had been sitting still for and he no longer cared. His mind was screaming at him to let it roam among his many errant thoughts. The time for peaceful contemplation had passed. Now was his turn to let his emotions ride high, to stop trying and hold back.

He dressed in the same clothes that he wore before and started pacing about the room, trying to work out the energy created by the roaring in his mind. All this walking isn’t going to help me fall asleep, he noted to himself. Which meant that he wasn’t certain whether to be grateful or annoyed with the room’s relative lack of space affecting his walking range.

Eventually, push came to shove, and he wore himself down. So he plopped down on the chair overlooking the window instead. Looking out into this place he’s never been before, up into the eerily similar night skies, Sam was left with only one thought. He wanted to cry; he felt like bawling his eyes out, curling into a ball and sitting under a table completely in the dark. Unfortunately, there wasn’t any proper wall backed table to be found. And the unnaturally natural bright night sky combined with the streetlights outside meant that, even with the blinds closed, it would still not be dark enough.

Of course, all of that wasn’t the real reason why he couldn’t break down in anguish. The problem simply was that the tears wouldn’t come. His body wouldn’t heed his commands. Because, physically, he felt great! So why would the body waste resources on producing liquid waste when there was no chemical incentive for it to do so? Sure, that didn’t make any sense, but it still made more than him not being able to cry after the worst day of his life.

“Fuck!” he cried out, cupping his brow with his hands. “Fuck,” he said once again, his voice lowered to a despondent whisper. It had never happened to him before, not being able to cry. Usually, the tears came easy enough if he had a reason to shed them. Plenty of times he found himself crying for no discernible reason.

He felt that if he continued this way—his sadness bottled up—he was bound to explode. So he tried thinking of sad things, the memories that always brought him to tears. The death of his first cat Minnie, the ending of The Lord of The Rings, that one Adventure Time episode. Soon enough, he started thinking of things that never made him sad before, simply because they couldn’t have had the chance. The death of his parents and older sister. Hell, the death of the rest of family and everyone he’s ever known. Which also meant the death of his second cat, Sol. The fact that he had always kept some emotional distance from the orange idiot, on account of the fact that he’d have to bid him farewell after moving out, wasn’t enough to blunt the pain.

Isn’t it funny? It’s easier for me to feel sad thinking about Sol and Minnie than thinking about the death of actual human beings. I guess it’s harder to conceptualize their death. I mean, up until now, the saddest I’ve ever been was after Minnie’s death. Or maybe the accident. But now that the consequences for that are gone, does that mean the invalidation of my feelings at the time?

Fuck! How the hell am I even supposed to feel? Should I be sad because they died or because I won’t be able to see them ever again? It’s been more than a hundred years, so they’d have died by now anyway. So then, shouldn’t I be happy? Instead of being forced to witness them and the rest of humanity dying in an apocalyptic war, I can put some sort of distance between me and them. Imagine that they all either died before the war or survived to die after. Christ! What does it even matter? They’re all gone. I’ll never see anyone I knew ever again.

He started butting his head against the table as though the physical pain could untie the knots formed in his mind. After a minute, his pace slowed down before eventually stopping completely with his head laid still on the table. Finally, his body started corresponding to his mood. Finally, the mental weight that wore him down and emotionally exhausted him had a physical effect. Finally, he was tired, both in body and soul.

He didn’t know for how long he laid there before a familiar-sounding voice brought him out of his lethargy. “It is imperative for you to train in order to take an active part in the war,” it said. Sam didn’t understand how, but he knew for certain that the voice came from within his own head. It was like having a dialogue with himself, but ten times clearer. It took him a couple of second to regain his clarity of mind before he recognized why he thought the voice to be familiar. With exactly the same tone, the same sensation in his mind, the voice was just like the one he had heard at the day’s beginning, back in the void.

Who the fuck are you?! He shouted in his thoughts, shooting up from his sit and taking a wild look around. He started pacing around the room, but was unable to find anything out of the ordinary. Which didn’t mean much considering he didn’t know what counted as unordinary in this modern age.

“You need to speak out loud if you wish for us to hear you,” the voice intoned in his head once more.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“How the hell does that make sense?” Sam asked between clenched teeth. “You can speak in my mind, but can’t hear it?”

“It is impossible to read a mind.”

“Then how the fuck is it possible to speak into a mind?”

“It is different.”

“Different how?”

“One is possible, and the other is not.”

“Listen asshole, if you don’t start making sense, I’m going to run out of here, screaming about voices in my head, and flag the first nurse I see for a bucketful of anti-schizophrenic medication. The only reason I’ve yet to do so, is because that as of today, magic is real. So why can’t the voices in your head be real as well?”

“We are real. And we would advise you against making it known to others that you converse with us.”

“Ah-ah, sure. I bet that’s what every mental delusion says on the first date. Right now, I don’t care if you’re real or not, or why I shouldn’t tell other people about you. Circle back around to why you can’t read my thoughts.”

“I would advise against it. The time we have available to conserve with you is a limited resource.”

“Don’t care. Either you start from there, or you don’t start at all. And I’m warning you, I am very good at thrashing my head against the pillow in order to block out intrusive thoughts.”

“The mode of magic we are using in order for you to hear us translates our direct mental input into information that your mind is able to interpret as words. Usually, it requires a mutual link constructed by a pattern imprinted on both parties at the same time, for tracing it is a practical impossibility. We, however, are able to sidestep the practical constraints as a result of sharing in the same body as you. If you were able to use magic and were knowledgeable and powerful enough for the required tracing, you would have been able to talk with us mentally us well. But you would never be able to read our mind, the same as we are not capable of doing with you. It is impossible to read another sentient being’s mind.”

Sam considered asking “why not” but dropped that idea. Unless the electric sheep in his head were lying, they were on borrowed time, and Sam was interested in getting to the bottom of whatever was happening. “Are you satisfied with this answer?” The voice asked him.

“No, but I’ll manage. What I won’t manage is going ahead without answers to two questions. One: why shouldn’t I tell other people about you? And two, what did you mean by saying that we share a body?”

“We would easily be able to answer these questions by delivering the explanation we have prepared for you beforehand.”

“Fine, go ahead then.”

“We are a being created by the Reshan. We were created in order to monitor the Web until its death or ascension with the purpose of helping the integrated worlds and peoples flourish and advance. Crucial in our efforts in the matter was our ability to choose from among those of the integrating populace which we had access to, take them and remake their body before returning them at what we considered was the best opportunity for their civilization as a whole.”

“So you’re the reason for the discrepancy between our Taken and the other races?”

“Yes. Our decision-making process for your world was much more strained. Your kind did not have magic at all, which made them much more vulnerable to the Harots than the other races. We had to risk the life of many talented individuals by not taking them when young and returning them during your integration.”

“OK, so what about me then? How come I’m older than everyone else?”

“Your innate ability to sense base magic was the highest among all ‘Terrans’ we had access to.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It is known in this part of the Web as being a Thread-Weaver.”

“Oh, that. OK, so if I’m so talented, why not return me during the war? Couldn’t I have helped save more lives?”

“Possible. It is also possible you would have died. It was too great a risk, considering we have greater need of you now.”

Sam didn’t like the sound of that. He stopped his pacing and sat down with his back to the bed, his head resting on the mattress. “Why… do you have a greater need for me now?”

“That is the calculation we had reached—back when we were in our full form—before taking you. Before we were even aware of the existence of your world, the state of affairs was such that victory for the Epiraks was certain. Such a conclusion was against our directive, but we had no other tools available in order to prevent it. Until the Web started the first stage of integrating your world and we became aware of your kind. Thus, we spent the rest of our resources choosing amongst those of you we could to be Taken. You, had the highest potential amongst them, the best possible weapon against the Epiraks.”

“That’s asinine, you know that, right? How the fuck am I your ‘best weapon?’ And what do your ‘calculations’ tell you now? Are we winning son?”

“We do not know. Once we deduced the state of the war as unsalvageable and your being the best tool remaining to us in order to save the Web, we transferred our consciousness to your body while it was being remade.”

“Come again? And make it make sense this time.”

“Once we did all we could do to help the Web from our previous position, we began the process of transferring what we could of our sentient mind to your body. This was in order to be able to help you directly.”

“And what happened to all the other things you were in charge of?”

“That which we were able to manipulate ourselves, such as the returning of Taken, we left with an extensive set of commands and redundancies. That which was under our purview but also had caretakers of their own, such as some of the facilities left behind by the Reshan. We left with orders to aid you and all those fighting against the Epiraks. Anything else was left to the natural behavior of the Web or to the instinctual behavior of the mind we left behind, if there is any.”

“Swell, so you handicapped yourself for nothing. Cause I’ll tell you what. It’s really lucky that you’re not able to run those stupid calculations anymore because they’ll tell you this straight away: you’re fucked. You wanted a Hannibal to save Carthage from Rome but instead you got Hannibal’s dumber younger brother. Nah, fuck that, I’m not even anywhere near as good as Hasdrubal. There is no way in hell that I’m the right person for the job of saving the world.”

“You had the best potential, that is certain. What is also certain is that without your intervention, the Epiraks are sure to win. Billions will die and the few that won’t will lose their identity. Leaving you as their only hope for salvation. We heard all of your conversations today. You spoke of the importance of morals. Are you not going to try and save them?”

“Fuck!” Sam shouted. “Of course I’m going to try. I was going probably to anyway. I’m just telling you, you’ve got the wrong guy for the job!”

“We disagree. And this is why it is paramount that you do not tell other people about us.”

“Why not? Are you afraid that everyone around me is an evil spy? Fuck, do the bad guys—the Epiraks—even have spies?”

“Spies are not our concern. It is the knowledge of others regarding your status and us. Shared knowledge has weight.”

“Weight? Are you joking?”

“We do not. Until you are able to perfectly control your threads. It is paramount you do not tell other people what we told you. Even be they the greatest of Rulers or even Chosen. There is still a chance for the enemy to learn of you, and that is too great a risk.”

“Fine. So no telling other people about the voice in my head. What else? What do you want me to do?”

Sam waited for almost a minute, but the voice had yet to respond to him. “Hey! Are you still there?” Receiving no reply, Sam realized that his uninvited guest’s telephone tokens must have run out. “Shit, bastard cut out right after giving the most cliche explanation for why not to tell other people about this very important plot device.”

He could, of course, stop thinking like an asshole and realize that the entity’s words made perfect sense. If Sam was indeed the chosen one, or even if he wasn’t, but people thought he was, then the dark lord would surely want him dead. And unless it was a really stupid dark lord, they were going to have spies among the forces of good, or if not spies, figure it out through the threads or whatever it was that had weight to it. And unless it was a really cliche dark lord, she was going to want him dead the minute she heard about him. So, provided the voice was being truthful in the full sense of the word, that was indeed a good enough reason not to tell people that death and destruction loomed on the horizon. Although there was the discussion whether that reason was really good enough. Was his information not enough to thwart doom? Was he really the necessary chess piece for humanity’s survival?

Trying to digest everything he just learned left Sam even more physically tired and mentally drained than he was before. The unbearable melancholy of everything he had experienced and learned today was now also accompanied by the crushing weight of the anxiety, risen from the ashes thanks to his new heroic duty.

Sam was done. He was well and over finished with this stupid fucking day and this stupid fucking world and this stupid fucking future.

“How poor must destiny be, for it to have chosen, one such as me? Fuck…That was way too good for me to have come up with it on my own… I must have ripped it off from somewhere.”

Without even realizing it, he started trying to force himself back up, on to the bed. Weakly grabbing at the top of the mattress, he eventually cajoled his body to rest on the soft surface. Lying there, with his face squeezed onto the pillow, not even bothering to cover up with the blanket, Sam found his mind truly blank for the first time since the day started. Moments later, he felt his cheeks beginning to wet.

Paradoxically, a smile crept upon his face; he was finally able to cry. And while the smile didn’t last long, he was still crying when sleep found him.