Conversations in the Deep

Dez opened his eyes, gasping for air.

He was underwater, deep down. The pressure on his chest felt immense. But he couldn't move an inch.

Suddenly, there was a hand on his shoulder. From Dez's left, a man came into view above him. A man that looked an awful lot like how he'd envision an older version of himself. The man's pale hair was long enough to be tied into a low ponytail. The purple halo rested on the left side of the man's head, its color was washed out and faded.

"There, there. Take it easy now," the man said. He had Dez's voice, but older, gravelly, and more tired.

Once Dez settled with the idea that he could somehow breath underwater, he asked, "Who are you? Where am I?"

The man thought a moment, then said, "It'll be easier if you come with me first."

The man swam upwards and then turned, waiting for Dez to follow. As Dez sat up and floated upwards, he glanced down. His eyes widened in horror.

Strewn across the lake bed were bodies. And not just any bodies. They all resembled Dez but also the man who had found him. The faces ranged in age between his own and closer to the man's.

Dez looked back at the man and growled, "What the hell is going on here?"

The man gave Dez a small, sad smile. "Do you remember Magmite Prime?"

The memories struck Dez like a bolt of lightning. He held his head in his hands as he recalled everything: finding the trap door in his lab; finding the tofu clones and Magmite Prime; and the truth about the 'one and only' Magni Dezmond.

"I'm...dead." Dez wrapped his arms around himself and shivered. He hesitantly looked at the man. "So does that mean...?"

The man's face still held that sad smile. "My name is Magni Dezmond. I am--or was--the first successful iteration created by Magmite Prime."

"What about...the others?" Dez asked, his voice shaking.

Elder Magni glanced down at the bodies, then looked back at Dez. "There's only one other here, aside from us two."

As if he'd been summoned, another form came closer out of the shadowy depths. This Magni was older than Dez, but younger than the elder. His hair was cut shorter than Dez's, and the faded purple halo was just visible on his neck, half obscured by the clothing he wore. "I see we have a new arrival." He gave Dez a small smile and a nod.

Dez was unnerved by the second man's almost nonchalant attitude. "H-how can you act like any of this is normal?"

Younger Magni chuckled, and when he spoke, the resignation was evident. "Because we've been here a while. This is just how things are." He cleared his throat and added, "As you might have surmised, I am also Magni Dezmond. However, I was some iteration further down the line, when Magmite Prime strove to make a version with better longevity."

Elder Magni motioned for the two to come with him. Out of nowhere, a table appeared, set with three cups. The elder and younger sat, and Dez followed suit.

As Dez shivered again, a soft blanket materialized, draping itself over his shoulders. It took him a second to recognize that it was exactly like his favorite blanket.

"You're quick to catch on." Elder Magni couldn't help chuckling. "In this space, you can create things you require, sometimes without meaning to." His cup was steaming, and Dez caught the aroma of black coffee.

Dez reached out to the cup in front of him and thought of his patented Copium. The red liquid filled the cup, and he took a sip. His nerves eased, but only ever so slightly. This whole situation was bizarre, something he never could've fathomed.

"How is this possible?"

"In our current incorporeal state, we are cut off from the natural order of things." Younger Magni took a sip of his drink. "Of course, we were already unnatural to begin with."

"Wait. You mean, none of this is real?" Dez asked as the realization dawned on him.

The eldest could only smile cryptically at him. "As real as you want it to be. But absolutely separate from the reality above."

Dez had a hard time wrapping his mind around the concept. He could feel his teeth and fists that were clenched in frustration at it all. He felt the tears that overflowed as he grieved for the life he had lost. But it was his consciousness that somehow registered everything, not a functioning physical body.

They were trapped in limbo, not alive, but not dead. They had nowhere to go, and no choice but to stay put.

Elder Magni sighed wistfully. "I still fantasize that some day, Magmite Prime may come to the conclusion that we're needed. That they'll come back for us. That thought sustains me, makes me feel that it's worth holding on."

Younger Magni gripped his cup tight, mouth flattening into a line before saying, "Other times, we fall into something akin to sleep, maybe closer to being comatose. When this reality becomes too hard to bear. When we feel like we've been forgotten, and there's no one coming."

"It's just an endless cycle, huh?" Dez spat, then let out a shuddering breath. His tone turned quiet, pleading. "...There's nothing we can do?"

"As if we haven't come up with plans before." Younger Magni shook his head. "They're great and all. If only we had physical bodies to execute them. Lacking that, it's just like playing pretend."

Dez glanced at the motionless versions of himself resting on the bottom of the lake. Elder Magni answered the unasked question. "There's many reasons why these poor ones are failures. They couldn't manifest like Magmite Prime wanted. Unable to hold a soul in the first place, of course we wouldn't be able to somehow insert ourselves."

"As for our own bodies, well. They deteriorated or stopped functioning for one reason or another." Younger Magni gazed in the direction of his own body sadly. "Even though I can still enter it, it won't move again, no matter how much I try."

Silence fell for a time, the three taking sips of their respective drinks. Then the eldest Magni spoke as he rotated his glass in his hand. "As you can see, I'm the oldest here. I don't remember when I came into existence, just that I existed and worked. I became tired. One day, the exhaustion was too much, and I fell asleep. When I awoke, I was here, alone. There were bodies besides my own, but there was no one to welcome me to this fate.

"When I learned my body could no longer move, I attempted to return to the surface in this strange new form. It's possible; however, we're more like ghosts than people now. A whisper of an existence. I spent a time above, learning the truth of what had happened: that Magmite Prime had decided it was time to let me go, that the newer model was ready." Elder Magni gave a joking smile to the younger, who smiled back sheepishly.

The elder continued. "I observed my successor's experiments, as well as Magmite Prime's. It became crushing being able to see and hear everything, and yet be unable to influence anything.

"No matter how loudly I shouted, there was no one that could hear me.

"And so I returned to this solitude, reflecting on what I had learned in my time above, and on my life. I was just a means to an end, as the magmites and my experiments had been to me. A continuation of unfinished work that belonged to 'Magni Dezmond,' someone that was both me and not me. The work to bring back someone he had loved, and by extension, someone I had loved."

After a beat, Younger Magni laughed a little. "The earful that I got from the old man when I got down here. Apparently I had barely done anything right, whether it was my experiments or my life in general.

"It was a bit of an awkward transition for me, when Magmite Prime let me out I guess. I was just me, with no knowledge that 'Magni Dezmond' had been a much older man. In my mind, I had my goals, knew what research I had to do, but for one reason or another, a new lab had been set up far from the old lab in my memories.

"I worked hard, put my nose to the grindstone, didn't interact much with others. Somehow, I still made enemies. And what alliances I did have were soon burned by one party or the other. Betrayal on all sides, left with no one but myself." He grimaced and shut his eyes for a moment, before a bittersweet smile graced his features. "...and the magmites, I suppose. At the time, their unwavering--and occasionally overbearing--support always mystified me.

"My time ended abruptly at the hands of another, a stranger likely sent on behalf of some vengeful benefactor. The magmites found me breathing my last and managed to carry me back to the underground lab. I met Magmite Prime, and I wept. Seeing them unlocked the memories of that first success that was simultaneously a failure to bring back the one we loved. The one we still love.

"I ventured to the surface to visit the approximate place where they had died. Even after all the time that had passed, I strained to find anything that could solidify in my mind that they had once existed. I just wanted something to justify the hand-me-down love that still lingered. Of course, the elements are relentless and I found nothing. But the feelings I had didn't go away.

"When I returned here, I tried everything I could fathom to repair my body, to get it working again. But as I said, with how we are now, it's like playing make-believe. I still haven't figured out a way to make it real..."

Younger Magni motioned at Dez with his cup. "I stopped by to watch you, just once. It was...too much. Magmite Prime had succeeded in making a version that would grow through adolescence. In a way, it felt like you and the old man got to live your lives. I was just an in-between, meant to progress the research just enough for Magmite Prime to take advantage of it.

"And how could I ever hate them for it? This whole twisted mess started because 'Magni Dezmond' loved them too much. Because we couldn't let them go. And they were just reciprocating those feelings in the only way they knew how."

When Younger Magni said no more, the elder looked Dez in the eye. "Down here, we get glimpses of the current one's life. Like a half-remembered dream. But if you don't mind indulging a couple of older souls...how was it for you, Dez?"

Hearing the nickname from his own, albeit older, mouth caused his chest to tighten. Dez's eyes pricked with new tears as he thought about it, everything his life had been flashing by at rapid speed. "Is this what the two of you do?" he asked bitterly. "Reminisce about your lives?"

The younger Magni nodded solemnly. "It's about all we can do. Perhaps we're trying to grasp at straws; tug on anything that could let us be...not here."

Dez stared into his cup of Copium. Then he took a deep breath, let it out, and chugged the cup's contents. Immediately, that floating feeling washed over him.

"I don't know how much help the stories of my life can be. While I was 'up there,' I guess, I was the 'Great' Magni Dezmond, self-proclaimed alchemist of the guild TEMPUS. But here, I...I feel like a child compared to what the two of you have experienced."

"More social experience than me," quipped Younger Magni.

"And you did subject yourself to the alchemical constructs," Elder Magni stated matter-of-factly. "For myself and this Magni, they were already in place by the time our existences began."

A huff of a laugh escaped Dez's lips. "No way you two are saying I somehow have the most 'life experience' here..." He ran his hands over his face and decided to just start from the beginning.

Dez described his village and his initial benefactor that had sent him to the Academy, then his life at the Academy. He realized now just how much what he had experienced at the end of his days at the Academy had mirrored those of 'Magni Dezmond.'

Love, separation, death, maddening grief, pain, failure. My own magmites... "Perhaps," he mused darkly, "I'm more similar to the source material than I want to believe."

Younger Magni added, "Perhaps it was part of Magmite Prime's intentions for you."

"Fuck that," Dez vehemently replied. "The life I had was mine. I will die a second time on this hill."

The other two barked out with sudden laughter, the sound alien to these depths but not unwelcome. Dez's mouth quirked up into a half-smile. I suppose if I'm going to be stuck down here, at least I'm not bad company.

Dez glossed over the time after he left the Academy, as he took that 'self-proclaimed alchemist' title for himself. He got to the point where he talked about Altare recruiting him into the guild and meeting the rest of HQ and Vanguard. Dez had to pause as the lump in his throat grew too large to continue.

"We can reconvene later, if you need some time...?" Younger Magni awkwardly offered.

Shaking his head, Dez let a few tears fall before sniffling and wiping them away with his blanket. "I'd rather get this all out now and let you guys pick it apart for a while."

He cleared his throat and resumed talking about TEMPUS, its purpose, and the guys. Dez couldn't help the warmth that seeped into his words as he described each member of the guild. These were things he would've never said to their faces, but truths he held about them nonetheless.

"They always joked that I'd be first to betray the guild. I suppose dying and leaving them with some shiny new Magni counts." Dez put his face in his hands and laughed with self-loathing and a sudden intense sadness. Hopefully they never realize it's not me.

Elder Magni chimed in with a very on the nose, "If you held them in such high regard, the change likely won't go unnoticed. Though...it's hard to say how they'll react, if they'll take any action."

"It'll be better for them if they just move on." Dez said, his words muffled by his hands. "Especially if Magmite Prime has no plans to stop.

"I say this because...I found the underground lab by accident. I went down there myself. They have several of me at the ready. Magmite Prime's altered their body into a metallic behemoth, just to continue their work.

"This undying love of theirs... I can't curse it; I got to live because of it. But it's also the reason I died.

"My body just started failing. My vision was going blurry, and I had to wear glasses. I was tired all the time, even broke my back at one point... I thought I just needed a rest, but Magmite Prime set me straight... And sent me down here after telling me everything."

Dez made to push his glasses up his nose, but his fingers met nothing. He blinked a few times when he realized his glasses were gone; so was the ring he normally wore on his index finger.

"That leader of yours, Regis Altare. He followed your body down here." Younger Magni spoke softly, cautious of how Dez would react. "You hadn't gained this consciousness yet. Even if you had, you wouldn't have been able to interact with him. He took your glasses and ring with such a pained look on his face. He lingered for a while before he finally returned to the surface."

At this, Dez really couldn't help breaking down, putting his arms on the table and burying his face in them as sobs shook him. The elder Magni gently patted Dez's back soothingly.

Younger Magni startled and immediately became apologetic. "Sorry, Dez. I--"

"No, I... Thanks for... For telling me." Dez's words were spoken between sobs. "But um..." The cogs in his brain were starting to turn as he calmed his sobs down to sniffles. "Has anyone else besides Altare ever come down here?"

Elder Magni thought a moment. "A magmite comes by every so often. I can never tell if they sense us. But now that you ask, no one has ever actually come down here, aside from your leader."

"...Didn't you say something about him being a 'demon god king'?" Younger Magni asked, and Dez could see the wheels begin spinning in their brain as well.

"Yeah. He is. Or has the powers of one, anyway." Dez didn't know exactly how Altare's powers worked, but it was enough of an idea that he got up from his chair and began pacing. "If we could somehow get him back down here, we need to test it out: if he can see us. If he needed his powers to get down here, then maybe... Maybe he'll be able to see us, and hear us, and help us get out of here..."

There was no reaction, so Dez looked at the other two, who both looked back at him with wide-eyed wonder and just a hint of hope. Between the other two, this had never been a possibility. But now... They tried their best to not jump out of their chairs with enthusiasm for an experiment that was yet to begin.

Dez laughed at their expressions, the last of his tears drying on his cheeks. The two Magni's began to enthusiastically discuss logistics for the experiment. None of them knew how long it would take to implement any of these ideas, or what sort of outcome they were truly aiming for, aside from being free from the depths.

As Dez turned his face upward towards the surface, a lone beam of moonlight graced his face, as did a small smile.

You boys haven't seen the last of the one, the only, the 'Great' Magni Dezmond.