The man in green turned around to see Nastasia standing next to Merlon, looking as if they had just come from the tower. "Um, who are you?" Nastasia asked, pointing at Dio while Merlon gave him a thoughtful look.

"Me? I'm-" Dio started when Luigi quickly stepped forward and interrupted him.

"He's no one important! Just a friend! W-We came to see Merlon about a... private matter."

Nastasia immediately crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, suspicious as ever. Why on Earth would Luigi of all people be back in Flipside? She had seen Mario around a few times, but never Luigi. The man in green had always been too traumatized to return. So there had to be a reason.

And the other guy, his voice... there was something off about it. He had only spoken so briefly, so she wasn't sure. But she already had her suspicions.

"... Leave us, Nastasia," Merlon breathed, looking at Luigi and gesturing into his home.

Nastasia, staying professional as always, nodded and stepped back, folding her arms in front of herself. "Um, K then. I'll see you later then. Yeah." She then scurried off.

Merlon nodded back at her, then welcomed Dio and Luigi into his home, sitting himself down and giving them a thoughtful look. "It is great to see you again, man in green. I was afraid I never would."

"Well... something weird came up," Luigi breathed, curiously looking out the window. He didn't want to admit out loud that he too thought he never would be returning. "Why were you talking to Nastasia?"

"Oh, the same reason as always. She wishes to find a way to bring Blumiere back into her life. Though I have told her time and time again that it is impossible." Merlon admitted, clearly not shy to share information on other people's problems. This almost made Luigi reluctant to tell Merlon about the whole situation he found himself in. He could only hope that the ancient wouldn't go around and spread the word.

"Blumiere, what a funny name!" Dio giggled, unintentionally inserting himself into the conversation. "Is that French?"

To this, Merlon's face paled. The smooth sound of that voice... it could only belong to one person.

Luigi could see Merlon's yellow eyes widen and immediately stood up, holding his hands out and trying to explain. "I-It's not who you think it is, I promise! Merlon, just stay calm-"

"How are you here?!" Merlon questioned in an almost panicked manner, looking at Dio and pointing an accusing finger.

Dio however didn't catch the accusing tone. "Oh! I showed up at Luigi's house with a knife! And then he took me here to see you!" Dio chimed happily.

"OKAY, YOU GOTTA STOP TELLING PEOPLE THAT!" Luigi exclaimed.

The man in green then took a deep breath and turned back to Melron in a desperate attempt to recover from what Dio had said before the ancient went and called Mario to take care of the problem or something. "Merlon, this isn't Dimentio. Well... Er, it is. B-But not the same person. H-He's from somewhere else, and he's just trying to get home. C-Can you help?"

Merlon didn't reply, but Luigi could see his eyes squint slightly as he straightened up, slowly and carefully approaching Dio, curiosity lining his strides. "Hmm... his voice greatly resembles the jester... but his eyes are different. Could you... describe yourself to me, my boy?" Merlon started, still sounding cautious.

"Sure!" Dio chimed. "I'm Dimentio! But Luigi is calling me Dio in order to prevent any misunderstandings! I've been traveling from universe to universe in an attempt to get home to my family! I also LOVE your little town! It's so amazing. I've never seen anything quite like it-"

"Yes, yes, that's great. But have you any magic?" Merlon specified, holding his hand up and cutting Dio off before the cloaked boy poured out his entire life story.

______

Merlon continued asking questions, which Dio truthfully answered, not seeming to care how personal they may have been. Eventually, Merlon took Dio aside and sent Luigi out to town, saying he would need to call Nolrem and get a few "tests," done. So Luigi simply walked outside and took in the sights, leaving Dio in Merlon's care.

Now that he wasn't busy controlling an excited person, Luigi was finally given the chance to really take in the memories. He recalled being in that exact location outside of Merlon's house, a large void threatening to destroy all. And though he was no longer being threatened by the void, he could still feel the fear that it entailed. In fact, he was more scared now than he was before. Even though there was nothing left to fear, he feared the memories. They gave him unpleasant feelings.

He almost missed Dio. Dio helped distract him. He made Flipside seem happier than it was. He acted like it was the greatest thing ever created. Luigi could recall feeling the same way about the town before everything went down. He too used to be so astonished by the very concept of it being a town between dimensions. But now it was nothing more than a bad memory that he wished to forget.

He spent a few hours waiting. He walked the streets, went to the top of the tower, and did anything he could to try to pass the time. He could see that the dimensional doors were still functional and working, but he didn't use any of them. He wondered if anyone ever used them anymore. Probably not. There was very little reason to, after all.

He didn't call Daisy to explain what the strange conversation over text was about. He debated trying to explain, but he himself didn't really know what was going on, so he decided to wait until he better understood to explain to her.

He did accidentally trip once, scraping his hand, but it didn't hurt all that badly. Just left a small cut. It would probably heal in a few short days.

______

About an hour later he found himself sitting on the tower, looking up at the clear sky when Nolrem walked up behind him, clearing his throat and grabbing the man in green's attention. Luigi quickly whirled around and stood up, grateful for a distraction from his own thoughts, finally.

"Did you guys find anything? Do you know how to get him home?" Luigi asked.

Nolrem paused, then just silently gestured for Luigi to follow him, which immediately put Luigi in a state of almost worry. Silent answers were almost never good answers.

Was something wrong? Was Dio okay? What did they find out?

Nolrem lead Luigi back to Merlon's house and carefully swung open the door. Luigi nervously bit his lip, fearing what would be happening behind the door. He slowly stepped inside. And...

He froze up, his eyebrows raising as he saw what was happening.

Dio was on the ground, hugging his stomach and rolling around... laughing?

Merlon stood about a foot away from him, a bored and almost annoyed expression in his eyes. "W-what happened?!" Luigi exclaimed as Dio continued laughing on the floor.

"I conducted a variety of tests on him," Merlon stated. "Or... we TRIED conducting a variety of tests on him. We found VERY quickly that he's ticklish."

"Stop, stop, stop! Aha ha ha ha ha!" Dio laughed, still curling in on himself even though no one was touching him anymore.

"Stop what, exactly? No one is touching you!" Merlon exclaimed, sounding almost annoyed, which was odd to Luigi since Merlon had seemed so calm and level-headed most of the time.

"We... just tried testing his reflexes. He's been laughing for fifteen minutes." Nolrem blandly stated.

"Um... okay. Well, what did you find out?!" Luigi questioned, trying to move the conversation along. Though it was hard to with the sound of Dio's loud laughs.

"Plenty," Merlon breathed, pulling out a small paper that was filled with very neat-looking notes. It was quite different from Luigi's own handwriting. Merlon's letters weren't cursive, but still organized and neat. It almost looked like typed text. "But one thing is for sure. This IS indeed Dimentio. His DNA proves it."

"W-What?!" Luigi exclaimed. "But how do you know?! Do you HAVE Dimentio's DNA to compare it with?"

"Yes," Merlon stated, turning around and scrolling through a shelf until he pulled out another piece of paper. "Almost every magic user is tracked and documented from birth. The Dimentio WE know was born half human and half ancient. He had a brother as well, but his home was destroyed when he was young," The ancient explained. "And THAT Dimentio's DNA matches THIS one perfectly."

"S-So what does that mean?!" Luigi asked, trying to remain calm. "D-Does he have amnesia or something?!"

"No..." Nolrem added, carefully stepping forward and inputting himself into the conversation. "He does not have amnesia. You see, this here is in fact Dimentio. But he's... not OUR world's Dimentio. He's the same person, but from another universe, if you will."

Luigi froze, looking down at Dio, who was still hysterically laughing to himself. The man in green frowned, then looked back up at the ancients, a look of only confusion in his blue eyes.

"Allow me to explain," Merlon breathed, taking Luigi's shoulder. "He is the same Dimentio, but from an alternate universe. Something must have happened and put him out of place. He has all the same powers and attributes of OUR Dimentio, but different events made him turn out... differently. He never quite learned how to use all his powers simply because nothing snapped inside of him. He has all the potential inside of him, but he had no idea how to control or use it."

"I'm not completely powerless though!" Dio added, slowly calming down and standing up, still occasionally giggling.

"Yes. He does have one power we've never seen our Dimentio use," Merlon explained. "It's actually quite remarkable. I've never seen anything like it from any ancient. It may be something unique to him."

"Check it out," Dio beamed, grabbing Luigi's slightly scraped hand. Luigi silently hissed and closed his eyes since the cut stung upon being touched.

But, after a moment, the pain seemed to subside. It was instead replaced with almost a warm feeling. The man in green slowly opened his eyes as Dio let go, smiling brightly. Luigi then looked down at his hand and saw that the small cut was gone. It was like it vanished.

"Whoa... did you just... heal me?" Luigi muttered in astonishment, flexing his fingers. It was as if the small scrape was never even there. His hand almost felt better than it did before he even scraped it!

"Nope!" Dio chimed, holding up his own hand, which now had a small cut on it. "I just transferred your little cut to myself! It's something I learned how to do on my own! Pretty neat, right? Does your hand feel better?!"

Luigi frowned for a second, but then lightly smiled when he saw the excitement in Dio's eyes. "It does. T-thank you. But... you don't have to do that. I don't want you to deal with my injuries for me-"

"Oh, I really don't mind!" Dio giggled. "It's the least I can do for all your help!"

Something didn't sit well with Luigi about that. He didn't like just handing his pain off to Dio. But Dio seemed really happy about the transaction, so he wasn't about to ruin the mood and demand his scrape back. He didn't wish to seem ungrateful. So he let it slide this time.

"So... how do we get him home then?" Luigi finally asked. "To is own universe. How do we get him back?"

Merlon and Nolrem both exchanged almost nervous glances.

"We...er... don't know," Merlon finally admitted, looking down. "We've never dealt with something of this kind before, so how to go about it is unclear at the moment... especially since there are an infinite number of universes, and no way to figure out which one is actually HIS."

But...

There was a but to that. Luigi could see it in their stances. There was something more. Them refraining from speaking was making him nervous. Was it bad? Did they have to summon some sort of demon or something?

"But..." Luigi pressed.

"... I gotta find other me!" Dio chimed, sounding as excited as ever. "These guys say that since my powers are unique to myself, there's no way for me to learn how to use them. But other me has the same powers, so if he can teach me how to use them, I can learn how to teleport exactly where I need to go!"

Oh. So it WAS bad.

"W-What?!! But he's...well... dead! C-Couldn't we just find someone else to teleport you home?!" Luigi exclaimed.

"I'm afraid not," Merlon breathed. "Since we have no idea what or where this Dimentio's 'Home,' actually is, we'd have no way of getting there. But if Dimentio here learned how to teleport, he could teleport himself to the right place, since he's been there before."

Okay. He guessed that made sense. But they were ignoring a few MAJOR problems with that plan.

1. Dimentio was dead. He died during the Ultimate Show. That was that.

2. This was DIMENTIO they were talking about. The man who nearly ended all worlds. Someone Luigi never ever wished to see, think of, or even speak about again.

And 3. Even if they found Dimentio and summoned the courage to speak to him, why in the worlds would he help them?! That man felt no remorse or pity. If anything, he'd probably end up stabbing them both in the back or something. He would never do anything that didn't benefit himself.

"I can see you're uneasy," Merlon noted, looking at Luigi's queasy expression. "Believe me when we say that we feel the same way. However, Dimentio is safely locked away in the Underwhere, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem. And this is the only way we can think of getting this Dimentio home."

"Yes," Dio added, grabbing Luigi's arm. "Please. I gotta get home to my mom and brother. I've been gone for so long already. It won't be so bad! I promise!"

Luigi didn't like those words.

But... if Luigi was in Dio's shoes and separated from his own brother, he knew that he would do anything to get him back. No matter how scary it was. That's what brothers did. It was a fact. Luigi had a ghost dog back home to prove it. So, it wouldn't be fair to prevent Dio from doing the same. "...Very well." Luigi breathed, looking down.

"NO WAY!" A high-pitched voice seemed to shout from just outside the door, making everyone inside jump at the sudden noise.

"Hush Lass! 'E'll 'ear ye!" Another deeper voice loudly hissed from outside as well.

"Guys! Be quiet!" A third, much calmer voice demanded.

Luigi immediately recognized all three. He slowly let out a sigh, then walked up to the door, swinging it open to see who, but Mimi, O'Chunks, and Nastasia all fall forward into the house. It was clear that they were just a moment ago pressing their ears to the door and listening in on their conversation.

"How much did you hear?" Luigi asked, sighing and pinching the bridge of his nose.