The dream began not as a memory, but as a reliving.
There was no slow fade-in. One moment, he was asleep on his pallet, the scent of sun-baked clay and drying herbs in the air. The next, he was standing in the Global Plaza, the synthetic air cool against his skin. The countdown hammered in his chest, synchronized with the roar of the crowd.
"THREE..."
He looked down. Ninella's hand was in his. He could feel the delicate bones of her fingers, the warmth of her palm. He turned, and there she was—not a ghost, but solid, real, her face lit by the holographic display, her eyes sparkling with a joy that felt like a physical blow.
"TWO..."
"Kaelen," she said, her voice clear over the din, a sound he hadn't realized his soul had been starving for.
He tried to speak, to warn her, but the dream had its own terrible inertia. His head turned against his will, his eyes lifting to the sky. Luna Major swelled, a pockmarked continent of rock and dust that blotted out the universe. It wasn't falling; it was consuming.
"ONE."
The sound was not an impact, but the universe tearing at its seams. The light was not fire, but the unmaking of matter. He felt Ninella's hand tighten, a final, desperate pressure—and then she was gone. Not ripped away, but unwoven. He felt his own body dissolve, atom from atom, his scream a silent vibration in the pure, searing WHITE.
The whiteness did not fade. It solidified.
He was back in the featureless expanse. But this time, he had a form. And he was not alone.
Before him stood the being from his childhood nightmare, the Ikannuna. Its obsidian flesh drank the light, its impossible geometry a wound in reality. But the crushing disdain was gone, replaced by a terrifying, clinical focus. And beside it, another figure, shimmering with a softer, steadier light—a being of water and wisdom, with the face of an ancient, kind king. It was the archetype of Enki.
"You have walked in one world while your soul slept in another, Kaelen Vance," the Ikannuna's voice etched into his mind, cold and sharp as diamond.
The other figure, the Enki-archetype, spoke, and its voice was the sound of deep, slow-moving water. "The childhood gate is closed. The time for glimpses is past. Do you remember your purpose?"
The memories did not flood back; they reintegrated. They were not a foreign invasion but a homecoming to a mansion he had always lived in, room by terrifying room. The Central Genetic Archive. The sterile perfection of 2999. The crushing loneliness. The Seven. Liam, the Director. Chloe, the Biologist. Isabelle, the Artist. Julian, the Judge. Marcus, the Architect. Sebastian, the Astronomer. Their faces, their roles, their shared damnation.
He was Kaelen. He was the Witness.
"The system is balance," the Enki-figure intoned. "A body ages, a star burns, a civilization rises and falls. You are the immune system. You are the memory that fights the disease of oblivion. You will bear witness to history, so that its lessons are not lost."
The Ikannuna shifted, its multifaceted eyes reflecting a million dying stars. "You are a metric. A benchmark for a flawed creation. You will not age by the turning of seasons, but by the grinding of epochs. A year of life for every millennium you endure. Your flesh will be a record of time itself."
The final, chilling directive came from both of them, a unified cosmic decree:
"Remember your past. Remember your purpose. The Seven are scattered. The garden you have begun to tend is the first line of defense. Nurture it. For when the Ikannuna return for the final harvest, humanity must be more than a perfectly arranged bouquet. It must be a wild, vibrant, and unbreakable forest."
The white space began to crack like glass.
"Now," the voices echoed, fading. "Awaken, Enki. And witness."
He gasped, bolting upright on his pallet. The hut was dark, the village silent. But everything was different. The air was thick with the weight of forgotten ages. The simple, packed-earth floor was the first page of a new chronicle, its length unimaginable. The sound of his own breathing was the first tick of a clock that had just begun to measure an epoch.
He looked at his hands—the hands of an eighteen-year-old boy. But behind his eyes lived the soul of a man who had seen the world end, and who knew, with a certainty that settled in his bones like lead, that he would see it end again.
He was awake.