Regaining my consciousness, I feel a heavy thudding from my head. I feel as if there’s a thick log lodged in the middle of my brain. It’s a sharp stabbing.. discomfort. 

I feel fireworks going off inside the inner coils of my brain and an uncomforting grinding stirring up the workings of my mind.

The grinding works its way down from my brain to the top of my neck. What the hell is this?

I contract the muscles of my body in discomfort and feel the blood rushing inside the veins and arteries of my body. It’s a weird sensation, to say the least; feeling something active circulating inside the corners of your body having never been conscious of the feeling before. I, however, recognized the sensation because not a minute ago, I could not even feel anything.

Ah, why are my thoughts so jumbled? It’s as if there’s a training running down through the nerves of my brain triggering anything in its path. 

I feel a creamy substance in my mouth. It’s milky, icy, and melting down my throat. What the fuck is this?

Holy shit.

It’s ice cream. Ah, yes, it's my favorite dessert. Oh, that feeling is comforting. Triggering a nerve and getting exactly the answer I needed without going through a jumble of thoughts. Yes, without having to think, I know this is ice cream.

I feel something different this time. It’s.. in my brain? No, wait, it’s trickling into my nose. It’s the smell of lavender. Lavender…. Lavender.

What is lavender? Ladender…

Lavenfer..

What?

Laven.

Lavender.

Why am I so confused? What’s wrong with me? Where am I?

Without having time to prepare, I feel pain. Pain.

What is pain? My brain alerting me of danger, threat, or damage within my body. Yes. That is pain. 

I’m slowly beginning to recognize everything. I’m re-learning everything.

 Why am I re-learning everything? Did I lose my knowledge? How is it possible to learn something you already know about? It’s as if my neurons are traveling high-speed scanning every single word I used to know.

In time, the scanning feels as if it’s slowing down. Now, my neurons have moved on to analyzing my memories. 

Instead of concepts, words, things, it’s now thinking about feelings, thoughts, people, songs. The words I scanned are now being used to combine a huge circle that interconnects everything. Happiness, sadness, anger, rage. I feel all sorts of emotions, but the ones that affect me the most are love and… emptiness? Love, I feel a fuzzy feeling. Emptiness… sadness? Or is it depression? It makes me feel a pit in my stomach and a void in my heart. It feels so.. dark and.. lonely. I think of the word family and friends and a warm fuzzy feeling lights up my entire body from within. Ah yes, no more of the void.

My thoughts slowly turn into one cohesive unit which consists of my conscious, and my unconscious.

I reach into my deep memories using my consciousness, and my unconsciousness to assist with feelings and instinct.

Okay, yes. What was I doing?

I was at home alone, dragging my sixteen-year-old lazy ass into doing chores and homework. It looked like a groggy scene. The room was horribly messy, the windows were shut, the shades were down, and there was no light. My hair was covering my eyes and I was unable to see more. 

Okay, since I can’t see, what did I feel? My unconsciousness helps me by giving me a feeling of void.

Ah, I see. I wasn't a lazy ass, I was just sad and empty. 

My apologies, past self.

I feel my consciousness reach into my ears. Ah, I can hear it now. It’s rain.

It’s relaxing, to say the least.

So I wasn’t really that sad and empty of a person. I was just… is there a word for this? Oh, okay yes! I was in my feels. 

Why? 

Oh, okay. I saw my ex that broke up with me 11 months ago with a new boyfriend.

And.. I was sad. That’s illogical. I was sad when she broke up with me but I moved on two weeks after. 

Oh, wait, no, I didn’t. That was my past self’s lies to cover up his own heart. I did not move on. 

Without knowing, I looked for a rebound. Huh, that’s pathetic. 

Why did I not just talk to her again and try to win her back? 

Oh? Because the relationship was in the dumps anyway? Mm, I do not understand.

Ah, I misplaced the feelings I had for my ex to my rebound? Huh, the rebound wasn’t even in a relationship with you.

 Oh, it was to distract myself from her?

Thinking about them, I feel an intense urge to vomit, cry, and hole myself up forever in this darkness.

Within my core, I feel a void quickly spreading and numbing my thoughts. 

There’s a heavy cloud over everything. I can’t think anymore.

 Why is everything so dark and depressing?

I shoo the clouds away. 

If you were so sad, why didn’t you shoo the clouds away? 

Oh, it’s not that easy? I see.

Why was I so sad anyways? 

Oh, within two months my girlfriend and rebound both left me in the dumps. I distanced myself from your friends because they didn’t seem to care about my problems? 

It doesn’t sound that bad. Oh, the sadness affected my school life, relationships, and my performance in anything that I used to be good at; thus spiraling down into darkness. Okay, I understand.

Hmm, I started stereotyping every single female? Isn’t that just a trauma? It doesn’t seem too valid to develop a trauma though. Oh, I did it to shield myself from hurting that much ever again? Okay.

I think I’m getting a hang of it now.

I fast forward and now it seems like I’m walking on the streets. Stupid. Why are you walking outside if it’s raining? 

It helps to clear thoughts?

Huh, it would be cool if I could just know all of this without having to keep asking myself and awaiting a trigger from my neurons.

So how did I move from this scene, into the pitch-black hole where I am currently?

Awaiting a flash of memory, instead, what greets me is a horrifying sound that disrupts the calm atmosphere.

[Ding!]

ARGH WHAT THE-

It’s like a blind old man regaining his sight after decades of not seeing and being flash banged just moments after. That’s how it feels like but with my ears. My hearing sense was overloaded.

[Ding!]

MOTHERF- STOP.

[DING!]

YOU NASTY SACK OF SH-

[The system congratulates the host on winning the giveaway!]

I WILL KILL YOU. 

WHAT STUPID GIVE AWAY? ARGH, STOP BEING SO LOUD.

[Ding! Ding! Ding!]

STOOOOOOOO-

[Rejoice host! For out of the billions of candidates, only you were chosen as the sole owner of the Achievement System!]

What stupid system? Why are you so loud? 

I could not help but be sore. I was calmly analyzing my memories and getting an understanding and now everything from myself was being overloaded. However, what put me more in turmoil is that my conscious and unconsciousness were both yelling, screaming, screeching, and crying that this was not logical at all.

I feel overwhelmed.