Sam woke up from a dream. Sam woke up from a dream. He woke up from a fucking dream! The realization crashed upon his mindscape before his mindscape even came into view. His dreams were back; with them, everything else. Most important of all, the immutable confidence, the surety, that he who was who he had always been. And wasn’t that just the worst way to start the day?

He laid still on the bed, willing his brain to slowly lurch into cognizance, to try and organize all of his errant thoughts, feelings, and interpretations into a coherent mode of consciousness. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t even gather the will necessary to stretch his hand and silence the ringing alarm.

The seconds passed in agonizing listlessness, and still nothing changed. Nothing came to mind, maybe because it seemed like everything was already there. Hopes and dreams, displayed in the grandeur of their successes before shattering into the abyss of his failures. A million different lines of anxiety, each worming at each other and baying at his worth. Shock, trauma, fear, loss, anger, sadness, all coalescing into a malignant overpowering cloud of righteous depression. There was good there too: friends, fun, pride, purpose, care, mingling with everything else, winning some fights, losing most others. But out of all of those, only one thought that had any semblance of coherence to it.

Dreams. He was back to having dreams. And while he still couldn’t fully comprehend the meaning of that fact, he hated it with all of his being.

A sudden spark, an instinctive call to action, and without realizing it, he had silenced the majority of the outside world. Then he was back to inaction, to staring upwards at the ceiling without meaning, with no light of awareness shining behind his eyes. But, as is often the case, one action soon begat another, and the first mental command gave rise to a second, just as unguided as its predecessor. Sam burst into tears. Tears without meaning, tears without purpose, crying because that seemed to be the only course of action that his mind could decide upon without his input.

All the while, steadfast in its vividness, the mental focus on his returning dreams; the slowly dawning certainty of what that meant.

He hadn’t stopped crying by the time the first of his mental faculties started back up. The crying was basic, instinctual. It wasn’t Sam’s agency that directed his hollow weeping. It wasn’t even the confluence of his pent-up emotions coming out into view. His entire being was crying. Everything that made Sam, Sam, forced his body to break out in salt and snot. And he was barely even conscious of it.

All of his meagre mental resources were directed at the simple mechanical task of sitting up straight. The physical act passed in an instant, almost identical to its usual speed, but his clouded perception made its duration seem almost like a slow-motion dream. But it wasn’t a dream. His dreams might’ve been back, but he was more than certain that he left them behind him for now. From that certainty, he managed to gather the will for yet another action. Turning left, he put his feet on solid ground.

And still he was crying. And still he was waiting. Waiting without knowing he was waiting. Waiting for the haze to pass and for his consciousness to rise back into focus. For his awareness to start spreading from only knowing that he was awake to being able to service his waking self. Another moment passed without any change, his mind still unharnessed, his body still motionless, his thoughts and emotions still a whirling mess, and his tears still flowing freely. Another moment with no change, no direction, no reason, just oblivion.

A moment later and there was a change, a new direction, the first semblance of reason’s return. However, he was still not back to acting consciously, to thinking rationally, to actively directing his body and his mind. The unpenetrable mental fog was still there, still obscuring everything. It prevented Sam from understanding why he started walking towards the shower, why he was slowly undressing between each slumbering stride. It only allowed Sam to know that he was doing those things. To notice each of the steps he was taking towards the bathroom, that he was fully unclothed by the time he stepped in, that he turned on the hot water and laid his head against the wall.

And then, as the warm current, dripping by the sides of heads and through the small gap between his forehead and the wall, slowly intermixed with his unconsciousness tears, Sam Anders, in a flash, was back, for good and for bad. His mind was still filled with rambling thoughts and overwhelming emotions, joining and breaking in a chaotic dance that left no room for internalization. His body was still working on instinct, still crying its heart out. Rationality, still clouded and rudderless. Not fully back to himself, but back to himself still.

So, obviously, that was when his measured weeping turned into a full-blown bawling. Which, in turn, led to him collapsing on the shower’s floor and curling into himself, hands hugging knees and head in between them. The cursing soon followed. He cursed for everything that is and was, everything that happened and will happen to him, and for everyone and everywhere that he would never get to see again. London and Paris. Cats and dogs. Family and friends. Home and hospital. All gone. Most forgotten. And only a handful to truly remember them; what they were like; what life was like. With almost every other person, living on dozens and dozens of worlds, to never truly understand. But weren’t those other people the worst off? For they were, one and all, truly doomed, with only Sam Anders to save them.

With each second that passed, with each drop of lukewarm water dropping on his head, Sam felt more of himself returning; more of his consciousness coming into view; thoughts slowly drifting into a semblance of order; emotions molding with each other, solidifying into categorizable, recognizable sets of feelings. Sam wasn’t happy about those changes, because with them came the complete understanding of why he was feeling bad, and more importantly, the certainty that it wasn’t going away anytime soon.

“Ah… ah…” he let out a half-choked sigh and reclined his head backwards, letting the drops pelt him straight in the face. The crying had downgraded into a steady sob at this point, less because of a bettering of his emotions than because of an overwhelming sense of tiredness, mental and physical both. “Fuuuck,” he groaned and struggled halfway up in order to turn the water hotter. “Fucking shit.” He sat back down, once again enveloped in warmth, this time able to appreciate it.

I think we can excuse not brushing teeth today. I knew that I should’ve bought an extra toothbrush for the shower. He let out a half-chuckle, half-whimper, biting his lips in order to keep that whimper from turning his now half-assed sobbing back into a full-blown wail. It was going to come back; he knew that, just not right now, please, not right now. Let him stay strong, let him stay solid for a couple more moments. To gather himself, to get his thoughts in order.

Ideally, I should want to keep myself together for the rest of the day, right? Wish myself steady for the full seventeen hours. Let the crying pile up and vent it for a straight hour before going to sleep. He sighed. That’s not happening. I should be happy to keep myself from crying at any point today when I’m alone. God. I feel awful. Fucking fuck! “Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck! I fucking hate this! Ahhhh!” He flailed left and right, bopping up and down like a little kid unable to regulate his feelings, trying to release some of the pent up emotion he was feeling, some of the anger he wanted to lash out upon the world. It didn’t work. It only got him more angry, at himself and everything; more sad, for himself and everyone.

I gotta do something. I can’t stay in here forever. I gotta… I gotta… think, compartmentalize, figure out what I’m feeling and why. “Do something…!” he yelled at himself, pleading more than demanding. “Call Maurice! Right, call Maurice. He told him to call him when… when this happened. So I gotta do it. I can do it. It’s just a fucking phone call. Only need to get up, turn off the water, get into a bathrobe, grab my phone and call him. Only need to do that. We can do that. It’s easy. I can do that. Just need to start by getting up. The first step’s the easiest. Just get up.”

He didn’t get up.

It took him an extra minute before he managed to force himself to start working on that goal; another minute to gather the willpower to execute it; another minute to get up. Or maybe it didn’t. He didn’t have a watch with him. How the fuck did he know how long was he in the shower for? How long did each shambling action take him? All he knew was that it felt like forever, stumbling from one thought to the other; whiling away in stillness for no apparent reason after he had decided upon a course of action but had yet to act upon it; and doing said action, as slow and agonizing as torture.

But he did manage to get up. And he did manage to turn off the water after a spell of indecision, followed by a longer spell of inaction. The cold air meeting his warm skin was a great help in hurrying him along outside of the shower and into his bathrobe. And from the corner of his eye, a rightwards glance towards the mirror brought him face to face with his reflection. God, he looked… hollow, broken. Instinctively, he forced a smile, not a forced-smile, a true one for himself, for the parts of him that he was truly proud of and happy with. It came out fake. It wasn’t, but it did. But it wasn’t… was it?

He shook his head, somehow managing to tear his sight away from staring at itself, and proceed to fully don on the robe. He stepped back into the room proper, gulping, looking left and right in confusion and uncertainty. What time was it? Was he already late to meet with Sarah? Couldn’t be. If he really was late, she’d have called, or marched up here. Fuck… what was he going to tell her? Them? Anyone? What was he going to tell himself? What the fucking was going on with him? No. No. One thing at the time. We got Maurice to call. So let’s call him. Let’s call him. We don’t need to worry about anything else before doing that. Just gotta call him.

He made his way back towards the bed, where he had started off this terrible day so long ago. His muscles screamed at him to drop down on it. His mind begged him to do the same, let himself get swaddled in its familiar comfort, swallowed into the blissful ignorance of sleep. And what did the return of his dreams matter to detract from that pleasant suggestion? After all, they were just ordinary dreams. One and done with no vividness at all. Sleep would still be a welcome abyss, a reprieve from everything else, himself most of all.

He grit his teeth against that promise, and, grabbing his phone with a lurch, quickly retreated to crash down on the chair farthest from the bed. He didn’t dare look at the phone, not wanting to find out the time. Instead, he just directed it to call Maurice, wishing he could trade his current emotional whirlwind for the splitting headache from the last time he called him like that. And where is Farris to inject some comedic relief into this awful experience?

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“Sam?” Maurice answered his call. “Everything alright?”

“Yeah,” Sam lied. “No. No. I uh… the magic ran out. The effect of it on my brain, I mean. I’m… uh…”

“I understand. Don’t worry. I understand. It always seems overwhelming at the start. It probably feels even more so for you. But trust me, it gets better. I promise. You’re going to be fine. You’re going to feel fine. Should I come and get you?”

“Get me? Uh, no. No, I don’t think so. I just didn’t know what to do just now. Then I remembered you told me to call you when… this will happen. So I did. What now? Should you be coming to get me?”

“If not me, then, at the very least, Sarah. You shouldn’t be alone right now. Not that I mean there’s any reason why you can’t be alone. I’m sure you’re… It’s just Sarah will definitely want to be there for you.”

“I’m sure she does… But then why did you tell me to call you? Isn’t this a part of your protocols or something? Don’t you have to test me? Make your observations?”

“Right, yes, I do. But it can wait. It can definitely wait. We’ll get to it when it’s most comfortable for you. Whenever you want me to do it. It’s just protocol, like you said, no reason to get all caught up in it.”

“Then when should we do it? I’m asking you.”

“Ehm… well… how about breakfast, then? I’ll come to you. That way, you won’t be wasting any of your own time on this stuff. I’ll just join you for breakfast, which you have to eat anyway, and that way you’ll be able to do whatever you want to do with the rest of the day. Or we can do it during lunch. Or dinner. Whenever you want. I’ll just come and do it. I have a free day today. You don’t have to worry about me. Don’t even have to be today. Whenever you want, really.”

“Then breakfast. I’ll see you there.”

“W-wait! Wait!”

“What?”

“It’s just… I eh… I don’t want you to feel like you have to do it today or during breakfast just because that’s what I said.”

“No that’s alright. I agree with you. I’m not sure what I’ll be doing, but I’ll definitely be eating today, right? So getting this out of the way during breakfast seems like the right choice. And if I do need to do it, then today seems like the best day for it, no? Good to have something planned for today. I really don’t know what’s going to happen. Everything feels… you know?”

“Yes… I do. I do indeed. It is going to get better, you are going to feel better. I cannot stress this enough.”

“If you say so.”

“I do, I am. I have an exhaustive knowledge of most of the Terran Taken. They all made it through what you’re dealing with now, and you’re better and stronger than most of them. You’re definitely going to—”

Sam got distracted by the knocking, almost pounding on his door, and couldn’t hear the rest of what Maurice said. “Sam,” came Sarah’s voice from behind the door, “it’s Sarah. I… I need to use your bathroom. Can you please open the door?”

“Jesus Christ.” Sam almost managed a laugh and a genuine smile after hearing her lame excuse. He got up with a call, “Coming.” Into his phone, he said, “Maurice? Yeah, Sarah’s here. So if there’s nothing we need to talk about now…”

“No, there isn’t,” Maurice answered, but didn’t hang up the call. Sam did though, before leaving his phone on the table and closing his bathrobe. Then he opened the door and came face to face with someone who could’ve challenged his distraught visage.

“Hi,” Sarah greeted him sheepishly, hiding her hands behind her back. “Can I come in?”

Sam nodded and turned aside, closing the door behind her. He cleared his throat after a couple of seconds of her just standing in the middle of the room, looking at him worriedly. “Don’t you need to use the bathroom?”

“No. That was just an excuse. How are you feeling?”

“Funny. Maurice didn’t bother asking me that question. I would’ve counted it a detriment of his character if he didn’t keep promising me that I was going to feel better.”

“Yeah, well… Maurice was worried that you were going to do something drastic and wanted to avoid… you thinking along those lines.”

“And you aren’t worried that I’m going to kill myself?”

“I’m not. No matter how much greater the mental woe you’re currently suffering is compared to me or Maurice’s, you’re not going to act on it any worse than we did. You’re much stronger than us. Besides, Maurice was mostly projecting. He’s got an exaggerated view of his own experience going through what you’re going through right now. But the closest he ever came to suicide was just thinking about it for a couple of days, nothing actual, nothing drastic, and nothing that would have necessitated him being under constant observation.”

“So you’re claiming that you rushed over here under his urging and not your own?” Sam scoffed.

“No… It’s just that we each had different priorities guiding us. Maurice was scared for you and wanted to be sure that I’ll be here to watch over you… And I was just worried for you and wanted to be here for you, help you make this adjustment as smooth as possible.”

“Mhm… I have to wonder whether you think you’re doing a good job of it. So far, we’ve only talked about suicide. And you haven’t even tried talking me down from it. Just claiming that I’d be ridiculous for my mind to wander in that direction. Not sure I really appreciate that kind of opinion right about now.”

“Why? Have your thoughts… wandered in that direction?”

“Yes… No. I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m thinking right now. My mind feels like a jigsaw puzzle being pieced back together by a colorblind child. There’s no rhyme or reason to how anything currently works or how it’s working its way back to coherence. It’s a fucking miracle that I can sit here and talk to you like this. I can barely understand what I’m saying. Nothing makes sense besides the immediate future. Everything else comes and goes and every time it comes, I feel like shit, but I don’t get better when it goes. It’s like there’s too much information for my brain to be able to process, so it shut down and opened a bureaucratic apparatus instead. And every piece of shit feeling and emotion has to wait its turn to be processed, but in true bureaucratic nightmare fashion, instead of being digested and stored, the information is immediately lost after the image of it flashes through my brain and the palpations from it run through my stomach, and the emotion goes back to some random spot in line to try its luck again. Almost nothing makes sense and I’m just overwhelmed by whatever little sense is being made.”

“I—”

“Yeah, I know. You know what I’m going through. I figured it out already. Everyone like us goes through the same thing. I realize that as well. I also know that it’ll pass. It’s the only thing I’m holding on to, a promise of getting out of whatever this is, of feeling like this.”

“I do know what you’re going through. I’ll reiterate that again, even if you’re getting tired of hearing that. And it will pass. You can hold on to that promise more tightly than anything else I’ve ever promised you. But what I was going to say is that while you’re going through the same thing that I and every other Taken did, you’re responding to it way better than I did. I’m not lying or being hyperbolic to make you feel better. It’s the truth. The first day is the hardest, the first morning doubly so. The fact that you’re already as coherent as you are is something to be proud of. It took me more than a day to just regain the sense of self that you’re currently exhibiting.”

“Yeah… I don’t know how to take that for a bunch of different reasons. Least of which is that I don’t feel coherent at all. I don’t even understand half of what I’m saying. But coherence is the least of my problems. Evidently I’m making sense to you, or maybe I’m not and you’re just extrapolating or whatever. It’s everything else that’s wrong. There’s just so much… so much stuff. Ugh!” he groaned into his hands, rubbing his eyes and face before looking up to stare beyond Sarah once again. “If you weren’t here right now, I’d probably be back to crying in a haze. Only I’m starting to realize that the real problem is that as the haze is getting clearer, the urge to cry is getting stronger. Fuck! I just want to go back to how I felt yesterday. But I don’t even know how I felt yesterday. How was it possible for me to feel like that? There’s just so much. So fucking much.”

“How about you take it one step at a time, then? Make it more manageable that way.”

“Fine by me. What’s the first step?”

“I’d suggest getting dressed. It’ll help you feel better.”

Sam got up with a resigned nod and picked up his clothes for this morning from his second chair. “Trust me enough to leave me alone in the bathroom?”

“Of course.”

Behind closed doors, Sam stared dully at the pieces of fabric in his hands. Like it or not, they stood for something. The next steps for what he should be doing. He didn’t like it. All he wanted to do was curl up into a ball and disassociate. But he didn’t really want to curl up into a ball and disassociate. He didn’t want to do anything. So he might as well do the one thing that he should be doing. Might as well. Might as well. After all, by this point, enough of him came back to remember. To understand. So might as well. If he could, might as well do it.

After getting dressed, he returned the bathrobe to the hook, and walked over to sit back down in the chair he had just left. Not thinking through his thoughts, not looking ahead to see where his actions will lead. Just focusing on the moment, on the drive to complete the second step, on putting on each sock and tying each shoe. That was the right thing to do. It was the best thing to do. There was no reason not to do it. So doing it was better than not doing it. Which was why he was doing it.

“What are you doing?” Sarah asked.

“Tying me shoes.”

“Why?”

“…To get ready.”

“Ready for what?”

“To go out.”

“Go out where?”

“To the gym. To work out. That’s the fourth step, you see? Getting dressed, getting ready to leave, going to the gym, working out. Four steps. What I should be doing next.”

“Sam… you don’t have to work out today.”

“What else would I do?”

“Whatever you want to do.”

“I don’t want to do anything.”

Sarah stiffened before slowly releasing a sigh. “OK. So why working out then? You don’t particularly like working out on… ordinary days. And we should look at today as a sort of a… vacation day. A real vacation. One where you take it easy and do only what you really want to do.”

“I told you, I don’t want to do anything.”

“But surely there are things that you don’t want to do less than how much you don’t want to work out.”

“…Like what?”

“Like playing games. Or reading. Or watching something. Matter of fact, we can just sit here and talk, or not talk and just sit here. Point is, you don’t have to go work out. You can just do nothing today.”

“They’re all the same as far as I’m concerned. Working out is what I should be doing today, it’s what I would be going to do if I were feeling norm—like yesterday. So why shouldn’t I go do it now?”

“I can think of a dozen different answers to that question. And I think you’re coherent enough by now to think of them yourself as well. If there’s any day that you should be taking it easy on yourself, today is that day.”

“Maybe so. But right now, nothing seems easy. Everything, every plan I can think of, any usage of my time, sounds awful. So why not go for the one that’s just as awful as everything else but that I have to be doing anyway?”

“You don’t have to do anything! Ahem… I mean, you don’t have to do anything.”

“Maybe I don’t. But Sam of yesterday, and the two whole months before that, sure did. And while I’m obviously not that Sam anymore, I might as well keep up with the course he chartered for me. I told you, I don’t have anything else I want to do. It’s either working out, doing something, or just sitting listlessly and staring at nothing. And I’ll be honest with you, if there is one thing that I really don’t want to do the most, it’s sitting around and feeling bad for myself. I’m going to feel awful no matter what I do. I’m not going to enjoy anything I do today, so why not just… do everything as usual?”

Sarah chewed on her lips in thought before slowly exhaling. “Fine. I’m not going to tell you what you should be doing today. I said that it’s up to you and I meant it. You’re the boss. So if you want to go work out, that’s what we’re going to do. Whatever makes you feel the best—the least worst. You ready to go then?”

“Y-yeah. I am. It’s all in my bag. As usual. After you.” He followed her out of the door, closing it behind him with a slight shudder. Today had just begun, but he couldn’t help wondering whether it was going to get better or worse.