Sam opened his eyes to a desolate expanse that stretched endlessly under a bruised purple sky, the air thick with the scent of ash and decay. It seems like The Dream Dimension gripped them like a vise, refusing to let go.The Dawn howled through cracked earth, whipping up spirals of gray dust that stung his skin like tiny needles. In the distance, ruined houses leaned precariously, their walls crumbled and roofs caved in like the skeletons of forgotten giants. The landscape felt familiar in a way that chilled him — Utopia, the once-proud mutant haven off the California coast, now reduced to a post-apocalyptic wasteland of shattered dreams and broken promises. Shards of glass glittered in the dirt like fallen stars, and faint echoes of screams carried on the wind, fading just as he tried to grasp them.
Wanda lay unconscious in his arms, her body unnaturally light, as if the dimension had siphoned away her substance. Her red sweater was dusted with the same gray ash, her braid undone, dark hair spilling across his shoulder like spilled ink. The scarlet pendant at her throat flickered weakly — the only spot of color in this monochrome hell. Her breathing was shallow, her breasts were rising and falling in uneven rhythms, her face was pale and drawn.
Sam lifted her carefully, muscles straining not from weight but from the oppressive atmosphere that seemed to press down on him. The rules here were twisted: As he felt no hunger clawed at his gut, no thirst parched his throat, and the scratches from the feral attack felt like distant memories, healed or ignored by this unreal place.
But something about this Air is still not persistance. The air was heavy, suffocating, as if the dimension resented intruders and wanted to crush them slowly. It contained memories, the deepen traumas that crushed any living being.
He carried her toward the nearest half-collapsed house — a two-story Victorian structure with its front porch sagging like a weary mouth, windows shattered into jagged fangs. The door hung off one hinge, creaking in the wind.
Inside, the air was still stale, the furnitures were overturned and coated in dust, wallpaper peeling in long, curling strips that resembled flayed skin. The room was dark, Shadows lurked in the corners, shifting just at the edge of vision, as if the house itself was alive and watching.
Sam laid Wanda on a dust-covered sofa that, impossibly, felt soft beneath her. He knelt beside her, brushing ash from her cheek.
"Wanda," he whispered urgently. "Come on. Wake up."
No response. Her eyelids fluttered, but she remained lost in whatever inner storm had trapped them here.
He tried to wake her up, but no answers. Didn't know what to do, Sam stood up, pacing the empty room. They were ensnared — not just in the Dream Dimension, but in Wanda's subconscious. Her trauma had woven the cage, turning the realm into a mirror of her deepest pains, as it manifested onto the Utopia He saw now. He had to find a way out, for both of them, before the illusions consumed them.
He stepped back into the street. The pavement was cracked like dried riverbed mud, weeds pushing through in sickly green tendrils that seemed to writhe when he wasn't looking. Who's home is this? He was thinking, as The wind carried whispers now — fragments of voices, laughter turning to screams, names he couldn't quite catch. The horror crept in slowly: a child's toy lying abandoned in the dirt, its plastic eyes melted as if from intense heat; the flowers in the gardenbed died down, only the branches remained.
In the distance, one building stood out amid the ruins — a sleek, modern structure half-buried in debris, its glass facade shattered but the frame intact. A faded sign read STARK-FUTURE LABS- CALIFORNIA. The same lab from the initial vision that had pulled him in. Was it there when they trapped on the dimension, or was it something manifested for him only? Sam didn't remember seeing the building there. But he grew curious to check the building.
Sam's pulse quickened. He glanced back at the house where Wanda lay, then started toward it, boots crunching over broken glass that sounded like bones snapping underfoot. He had to know about it.
The lab's entrance yawned open, a dark silence placed all around the annex. Inside, corridors stretched in sterile white, lights flickering erratically overhead, casting strobing shadows that made the walls seem to breathe. Desks were overturned, papers scattered across the floor, equations and diagrams smeared in what looked like dried blood, the floor is dusted with a decades garbage. No bodies — just absence, an eerie emptiness that pressed on the chest of this abandoned building.
Suddenly, a sound echoed from deeper within: faint crying, high and piercing.
Sam followed it down the hall, heart pounding. The air grew colder, breath fogging in front of him despite the lack of real temperature. Doors lined the walls, some ajar, revealing overturned chairs and shattered monitors. One room held rows of empty cages — human-sized, bars bent as if something had clawed its way out. Horror prickled his skin: scratches on the metal, deep and frantic, ending in smears of old blood.
At the end of the corridor, the crying grew louder. He pushed open a heavy door marked OBSERVATION.
In the center of the darkened room stood a crib, wooden slats gleaming unnaturally under a single overhead light. A baby wailed inside, tiny fists waving in distress.
Sam approached slowly, a strange pull in his chest. The child looked up at him with wide, hazel eyes — his eyes!!
Sam try to touch him, but the scene warped.
The crib elongated, transforming into a cold metal lab table with restraints snapping around tiny wrists and ankles. The baby's cries turned to piercing screams. Fluorescent lights buzzed harshly overhead, illuminating a circle of doctors in white coats, faces sharp and intent.
He saw them, encircling around the table, the thin sound of conversation coming to him. He looked around the doctors, as he recognised some of them.
Dr. Donald Blake, the tall, blond guy, stood behind the table as he hold some pages in his one hand. Once Thor's mortal alter ego, now a geneticist specializing in divine-human hybrids, his hands steady as he adjusted his bifocal.
Beside him, there was Dr. Leonard Samson — green-tinged hair tied back, the gamma-powered psychiatrist known for his work on rage control and mutation stability, scribbling notes with a frown.
In the far corner, Dr. Cecilia Reyes — dark hair pulled tight, the mutant doctor with force-field powers, her expression grim as she monitored vital signs into the monitors.
Several other scientists milled in the background — nameless figures in lab coats, adjusting machines, whispering data points. But at the head of the table stood a couple — man and woman — name tags reading DR. PETERS.
Their faces were blurred, as if smeared by an invisible hand, features shifting and melting whenever Sam tried to focus. The man's voice was muffled, saying something about "genetic viability"; the woman's hands trembled slightly as she injected a syringe into the baby's arm.
Behind them loomed five vertical chambers, glass fogged with condensation, dark silhouettes floating inside like specimens in formaldehyde. Tubes and wires snaked into each, monitors beeping steadily. Plaques at the top read:
NV alpha 11080901, 11080902, 11080903, 11080904, 11080905.
New Weapon X? Sam thought, stomach twisting. Or something worse — they were human trials, but why this renowned names working upon them?
He stepped closer, desperate to see the faces of Dr. Peters clearly, to understand why his blood resisted the virus, why he alone survived. But their faces were still blurry. He tried to go further, untill a blunt force reach to his shoulders and slammed him outside.
He flew backward, crashing into the corridor wall with bone-jarring impact. The lab doors sealed shut with a hiss. Alarms blared — shrill, piercing. Flames erupted from the vents, unnatural scarlet-tinged fire roaring up the walls, licking toward him with hungry speed. The heat was real now, blistering his skin, smoke choking his lungs.
The building was burning alive.
Sam scrambled to his feet, coughing violently, eyes streaming. He ran for the exit, but every door sealed with walls of flame. The corridor twisted, lengthening impossibly, floors buckling under the inferno. Horror clawed at him: screams echoed from the chambers — the NV subjects coming back, trapped, banging on glass as fire consumed them. One pane inside a room cracked; he saw a hand pressed against it, skin blistering black before his eyes.
He was running fast, but the intense smoke disrupted his vision, as He collapsed to his knees.
Suddenly, a red light glowing in front of him, a pair of hand grabbed him — strong, desperate.
Wanda.
Scarlet energy wrapped around them both, cool against the blaze. She pulled him hard — and the world ripped apart in a burst of red light. He dropped into the dusted carpet into the house where Wanda rested, still panting.
.
.
.
Wanda gasped awake, her body jolting upright on the dusty floor of the ruined house. Her chest heaved with ragged breaths, as the air in the Dream Dimension felt thicker now, heavier with the weight of her unleashed trauma. She looked around frantically, her dress was dusty, her braid fully unraveled, dark hair matted against her pale forehead.
"Sam—where are you?" she called, voice echoing unnaturally in the empty room. Panic edged her words, the pendant at her neck pulsing erratically. "Sam!"
No answer. The sofa where she had laid him—no, where he had laid her—was empty. The shadows in the corners seemed to shift, whispering fragments of old memories: laughter turning to screams, a synthetic voice calling her name.
Wanda pushed to her feet, swaying slightly as the dimension's rules pressed on her. The mental exhaustion was crushing. Pulling Sam from that inferno loop had drained what little power she had regained.
She staggered to the shattered window, peering out into the barren landscape. The purple sky hung low, oppressive, the wind howling through the cracked pavement like distant cries. Ruined houses lined the street, their frames twisted and decayed, doors hanging off hinges like gaping wounds. This was her fault—the trauma from Westview, from losing her boys, from the hex that had unraveled so much—had twisted the dimension into this nightmare reflection.
"Sam!" she shouted again, stepping out onto the porch. The wood creaked under her wool-socked feet, brittle and cold. Quickly, she sit on the floor, started chanting the hymn to extend her vision. It tugged eastward, toward the cluster of larger buildings in the distance. He was there—trapped in his own sub-dream, a meadow of illusions woven from his subconscious.
Wanda formed an astral figure of herself. Her astral form ascended through the dimension. The air itself cracked further under her steps, the blackish horizon lifted up as fog. Horror crept in with every shadow as long as she going forward.
She reached the lab—STARK LAB as the label upon it mentioned. The glass facade shattered, doors hanging open like a maw. Inside, Smoke billowed out, thick and acrid, carrying the scent of burning plastic and flesh.
"Sam!" Wanda plunged in, scarlet shields forming around her to push back the heat. She followed the pull deeper, past overturned desks and scattered papers.
At the end of the hall, she found him—collapsed in a ring of fire, coughing, eyes streaming from smoke. The walls buckled, ceilings groaning as they threatened to collapse.
Wanda reached out, her power surging with the last of her strength. Scarlet energy wrapped around him like a lasso, cool against the blaze.
"Hold on!" she shouted.
She pulled—hard—and the world ripped apart in a burst of red light. The lab dissolved behind them, flames snuffing out as they tumbled back onto the dusty floor of the ruined house.
.
.
.
Sam coughed violently, rolling to his side, eyes wild and streaming. He looked at her, recognition dawning through the panic.
"Ms. Maximoff—you pulled me out. Thank you. I feel like I am going to die there."
She nodded, collapsing back against the sofa, chest heaving. "I… I woke up. Saw You were.... gone. So I followed the trail. Found You were.... trapped in your own dream—meadow illusions, but twisted. I had.... enough power left to.... drag you free."
Sam pushed himself up, still panting, the scene flashing in his mind: the crib, the lab table, the screams. He uttered the two words again, "Thank you.."
Wanda wiped sweat from her forehead, her hands trembling. Some color had returned to her cheeks, but her energy was spent. "What happened? What did you see?"
Sam told her everything — the barren Utopia, the lab, the crib morphing into an experiment table, the doctors surrounding a baby. "I recognise sone doctors were there, Dr. Blake, the guy with blonde hair, Dr. Samson, Dr. Reyes,. And others I didn't recognize. But at the head… Dr. Peters. Man and woman. My parents. Their faces were blurred. I Couldn't see them clearly."
Wanda listened intently, her expression growing grim. "Blake — he was Thor's mortal alter ego once as you know. Samson is.. was a brilliant gamma-powered psychiatrist, expert on rage control and mutation stability. Reyes was a mutant as well as doctor, worked with trauma victims at X-Men facility. If they were involved… it was probably a high-level experiment. Dangerous."
Sam was sitting in the floor, thinking deeply. Wanda again said, "And the baby must be you, so they probably experimented on you. But why your parents there? And why they themselves participated into this? I am not able to understand."
"And the chambers," Sam continued. "Five of them. Silhouettes inside, tubes and wires. Labeled NV-01 to NV-05. Like Weapon X, but… new."
Wanda's eyes widened slightly, thinking, Nova. The project Natasha mentioned. Sam might see its heart.
Sam rubbed his face, the horror lingering — the baby's screams echoing in his ears, the flames searing his skin even now. "And my parents… why they were blurred? What's the reason?"
Wanda shook her head. "The Dimension hides what's not ready to be seen. Or what someone else wants hidden. Your mind... or some external magic is protecting it."
Sam looked around the ruined house, the dust motes dancing in fading light. "This place… what is this place? is it Utopia?"
Wanda's eyes filled with tears, her voice breaking. "Yes." She wrapped her arms around herself, shoulders slumping. "It's my fault we're back here. My trauma… it pulled us in. The hex, losing everything… it's always my fault."
Sam moved closer, taking her hand. "No ma'am. You were trying to help me. This isn't on you."
She wiped her eyes, but the tears kept coming. "You don't understand. I destroy things. People. Worlds."
"But we are able to come back stronger everytime," Sam said firmly. "Together."
Wanda nodded weakly, but the weight of her guilt hung heavy.
Night came fast in the dream — the purple sky darkening to inky black in minutes, stars winking out one by one as if swallowed. The wind outside howled louder, rattling the shattered windows.
Wanda still sat on the sofa, recovering slowly. Her power flickered in small bursts — a red glow mending a crack in the wall — but she was far from full strength.
Sam stood, restless. "We need rest. Let me find a place."
He explored the house, pushing open creaking doors. Upstairs, he found a room with two narrow beds — dusty but intact, mattresses surprisingly soft under the dream's rules. He spent time cleaning — using a torn curtain to wipe away layers of ash and grime, shaking out blankets that smelled faintly of lavender, propping the broken window shut with a chair to block the wind.
Satisfied, he returned downstairs and lifted Wanda without asking — arms under her knees and back, carrying her like she weighed nothing. She didn't protest, just rested her head against his shoulder, eyes heavy.
He laid her gently on one bed, pulling the blanket over her.
"I wonder whose house is this?" Sam asked softly, sitting on the edge of the other bed.
Sam was feeling guilty again as Wanda's voice was a whisper in the dark. "My previous home. Where I lived with my two boys. Billy and Tommy." He saw Tears welled again. "They were gone… and I destabilized. The hex — I rewrote history, wiped out all the mutants in my grief. Tried to bring them back, over and over. But they were fake. Illusions. Every time I tried to revive them, they faded. Like smoke."
Sam moved to her side, taking her hand again.
"It wasn't your fault," he said. "You were hurting. Lost everything. Anyone would break."
Wanda started crying then — quiet sobs that shook her frame. Sam held her hand tighter, murmuring comforts until the tears slowed.
After some time, he said gently, "You need rest. We'll figure this out in the morning."
Wanda nodded, wiping her face. "Okay." She closed her eyes, trying to let sleep claim her in this sleepless place.
Sam returned to his bed, lying back, staring at the cracked ceiling.
Outside, unbeknown to them, two small boys stood in the shadows of the street, hand in hand, watching the house with wide, unblinking eyes. Their forms flickered as they started walking towards the house.