The dream came quietly, without warning, like a memory that did not belong to him.

Zeke found himself seated in a classroom that felt both familiar and wrong, as if it had been reconstructed from fragments of places he once knew. The air was dull, the light pale and uncertain. Around him, students moved and spoke, but their voices were distant, like echoes behind glass.

Across from him sat two figures who did not belong.

Sherlock leaned back in his chair, eyes sharp, observing everything with quiet intensity. Beside him, Mycroft sat composed, hands folded, his presence heavy with something Zeke could not name—something inevitable.

There were snacks on the table between them.

Zeke reached for his, but before he could take it, Sherlock casually picked it up and ate it.

“It was only one,” Sherlock said, almost dismissively.

Zeke didn’t respond. Something about that felt wrong, but the thought slipped away before he could hold onto it.

The room shifted.

A strange lesson unfolded—uncomfortable, unnatural, as if everyone was participating in something they didn’t fully understand. Laughter came in short, uneasy bursts. Zeke moved when it was his turn, guided more by expectation than intention, then returned to his seat with a quiet tension sitting in his chest.

When he looked up again, the classroom was empty.

Only Mycroft remained.

Silence stretched between them.

“The end always comes,” Mycroft said calmly, as if stating a simple fact.

Zeke felt the weight of those words, though he didn’t fully understand why.

Then the world shifted again.

He was outside now, standing in a park that felt incomplete. There were no swings, no children, no movement—just open space and still air, like something had been left unfinished.

In his hands were dumbbells.

Or at least… they should have been.

He couldn’t see them.

But he felt them.

Heavy. Real. Undeniable.

Zeke lifted them slowly, the strain in his arms matching the weight his eyes could not confirm. Each movement felt deliberate, as if he were training against something invisible yet deeply present.

He turned to his cousin and handed them over.

The cousin took them without hesitation, as if the unseen weight made perfect sense.

No questions.

No confusion.

The moment lingered—quiet, heavy—before dissolving.

Zeke found himself in a room.

It wasn’t right.

The walls felt too close, the air stale, the space carrying a quiet unease that pressed against his skin. A bed sat in the corner, unmade. The room wasn’t broken, but it wasn’t safe either.

And yet—

She was there.

Samantha.

She moved naturally within the space, as if she belonged there, as if the room didn’t bother her at all. She had moved in, somehow, and they spoke softly, their voices weaving through the uneasy silence.

Zeke wanted to ignore the feeling in the room.

Because she was there.

And that was enough.

The scene shifted once more.

They were walking now.