Peeling away from his own body, Crane emerged in his astral form—a dim, translucent echo of himself, glowing faintly blue.
He hovered for a moment, weightless and detached, gazing down at the shell he'd left behind. His sleeping body lay still, chest rising and falling in slow, mechanical rhythm.
Above it floated a faint, pulsing orb—flickering with fragmented images and flickers of memory.
Crane drifted closer, eyes narrowing.
"If I can enter the dreams of others…" he murmured, voice weightless in the silence, "then surely I can enter my own."
He reached out with his left hand.
As his fingers brushed the surface of the orb, his astral form began to distort—drawn in like smoke pulled through a keyhole
His limbs stretched, then unraveled. His face warped. His body folded inward—
—until there was nothing left but silence, and the orb.
Then, with a final flicker of blue light, he vanished into the dream.
——————————-
Basement.
Crane's eyes snapped open.
Darkness.
He blinked once. Twice. Nothing changed.
"I was sure I just opened my eyes," he muttered.
He took a cautious step forward—then hissed sharply as his foot slammed into something hard.
"Shit—!"
He stumbled and fell backward, landing with a thud.
"Dammit…"
Grumbling, he rolled onto his side and pushed himself up.
"It's just a dream. No big deal. I'll just… change it."
With a breath, he focused—and light began to pour from him, a pale blue glow blooming outward.
The basement around him materialized. Brick walls. Old furniture. Rusting pipes.
He froze.
Eyes wide.
The breath caught in his throat, and for a second, his heart's pounded too fast to ignore.
"It's just a nightmare. Not real," he said quietly.
He forced himself to exhale, slowly, grounding himself.
"I don't need to get into my tragic backstory right now."
He waved a hand—and the scene shattered like glass.
The space reformed, one memory bleeding into the next.
A different place. A different time.
But still… too early.
"This is too far into the past," he muttered.
The dreamscape twisted again—places and fragments rushing past like pages torn from a book.
Laboratories. Schools. Streets. A hospital room. Another shift.
"Closer," he whispered, voice tightening. "Come on… give me something useful."
The dream obeyed.
But the further forward he pushed…
…the duller the memories became.
"Damn, my life was boring," he muttered, watching a full month of his past self nodding off mid-session, barely awake while listening to other people's problems.
Memory after memory zipped by in a blur—until one flashed across his vision: himself, sitting on a couch.
"Wait—what was that?"
He swiped his hand through the air, and the dream responded. The blur slowed, then reversed.
He found it again: himself, sprawled on a couch, eyes glazed, watching TV.
"This was the period of time where I binged everything."
He narrowed his eyes. "Getting close to Arcane… gotta go through this stretch carefully."
He peered at the screen. "What even was I watching?"
He peered at the TV seeing himself watch Dr. Who.
"Must've been the time I binged watched from beginning to end in one sitting"
The TV flickered with static, then settled.
Crane sat down beside his dream-self, who lounged obliviously on the couch, eyes fixed on the TV.
He picked up a remote from the table and clicked through.
"Let's see…"
The TV flickered—one show after another, memories flashing in sequence like cheap channel surfing through his own life.
"Doctor Who.
The Midnight Gospel.
Yo-Kai Watch.
Click.
Game of Thrones.
Godzilla Singular Point.
Godzilla (1954).
Godzilla Raids Again.
King Kong vs. Godzilla."
He tilted his head. "Damn. That's a whole lot of Godzilla."
The flickering scenes slowed again.
One memory stopped him.
He saw himself sitting at a table with his grandmother, carefully pouring her a cup of tea.
"I don't know how you like tea," his younger self muttered. "Don't see the appeal."
His grandmother smiled gently. "Once you grow older, you'll start to see the appeal of a nice cup of tea."
He scoffed. "Drinking tea will kill me."
Then, with a crooked little grin: "Besides, once I grow older, you'll probably be dead."
She gave him a look. "Don't say things like that. You'll feel sad when I really do die." She lifted her cup and took a sip. "And teadoesn't kill you."
Crane—watching from the dream—leaned back on the couch beside the scene. With a click of the remote, the memory began to fade.
"She was right," he muttered.
"Tea doesn't kill you."
.
.
.
"Just the tea I gave her."
His voice was low. Flat.
"Laced with belladonna."
He said it flatly, almost lazily, like it was trivia.
Then, without a trace of guilt, he flicked his hand and let the memory vanish into smoke.
A television screen floated before him, flickering through memories like old VHS tapes on fast-forward.
Images flew by—blurs of mundane days, half-forgotten clients, endless hours lying on a couch, binging show after show.
Then, finally… Arcane.
He paused.
The screen froze on the moment Jinx blew up the council in Episode Nine.
Crane stared at it for a beat, his face unreadable.
"…Just not Episode Nine," he muttered, pressing the remote again.
Episode One queued up.
With a casual gesture, the couch beneath him reshaped itself into a plush velvet chair, the surrounding space warping into a grand movie theater. Curtains parted. Projector light flared.
He summoned a bucket of popcorn with a thought.
"Some say the theater's where you go when you die," he mused aloud, watching the light play across the empty rows.
"I think there's some truth to that."
And then he pressed play.
————————-
I love theater's
I love pizza
You love arcane
We love little caesars