Deep//:Love 01 (Patreon)

Battista Alberti Love ("Al"), Native of Long Island, NY - and after a somewhat accelerated young life at Princeton University (B.A., Summa Cum Laude) and MIT (M.S./Ph.D., Magna Cum Laude), moved on to a short but profoundly successful entrepreneurship in the technology sector. When Al decided to divest from her company, she was given about $2 billion in cash - and millions more still made their way into her trust account as the corporate management begged to continue using her name. Thus, at this early stage in her life, Al was stuck with advanced academic degrees from the most prestigious institutions, more cash and cash equivalents than she could ever hope for, and on top of them exceptionally attractive looks and physique. 

Was anything else to come from life? Al wondered, and remembering that she was once a loyal anime fan as well as an ardent lover of ocean bathing (i.e. since she first got her feet wet on the Island's Jones Beach), she embarked on a series of self-guided cosplay ventures in honor of the anime scenes she most admired, exclusively those occurring under water surfaces. 

The first one on her list was Zoids Genesis with her debut as young Princess Rei Mii, to be reenacted in the underwater caves of Cenote Calavera, Mexico. Only the most seasoned divers ever dared into the cores of this intricate cave system, and that was with a dry suit and multiple tanks of Nitrox enriched air. Thus Al spent a good portion of her time convincing local authorities that she was going to free dive in bikinis, with no mask or fins, and that absolutely no safeguarding measures shall be provided to her. 

Then the dive day came. With the surface long behind her, the water was as tranquil as ever, with the smooth slab walls closing in and luring her into the deeper inner veins of the cave. Al almost rejoiced; nothing mattered now except to stay alive, a testament as to how much of this voluntary ordeal her body could endure. In the meantime, the cos-play should be attended with care and detail, with the arms stretched out and shunning any forward propulsion, in the likes of the underwater Rei Mii that Al came so much to adore.   

Art by Jim Liesman.