The Perfect Run

Bugs Bunny.

The rabbit was Ryan’s most beloved character in all of fiction, and he had watched all its cartoons during his endless wandering. The courier always laughed at hunters’ failure to catch the wily animal, their rage growing with each missed bullet.

So it must have been very frustrating for these two.

“Stop it!” By now, Ghoul fumed so much that it became difficult to see through the white mist surrounding him. The whole harbor was slowly freezing, while the Psycho threw car-sized blocks of ice at Ryan. “Stop dodging!”

Ryan lazily stopped time, moved out of a projectile's path, then cancelled his power. The Psycho was actually getting worse with his aiming the more angered he grew. Unfortunately, the white mist surrounding Mr. dem bones also made it impossible for Ryan to get in close without freezing in place.

He knew he should have invested in a thicker sweater.

“Ghoul, he’s a speedster!” Sarin snarled, still standing on a roof to keep the high ground. She was no more successful than her ally at hitting Ryan, who mocked her by activating his time-stop just when her blasts were within an inch of reaching him. At one point, the courier even took the time to blow her a kiss. “Just freeze him already!”

“I’m not a speedster, I’m Quicksave!” Ryan shouted, before revealing his greatest secret. “I’m immortal, but don’t tell anyone!”

“Soon you’re just going to be blood on the pavement!”

What pavement? By now the two Psychos had destroyed the entire waterfront, turning it into an icy wasteland of snow and craters. Ryan had to keep moving north to find ground to stand on, eventually luring the duo to an empty parking lot.

While Ghoul pursued him on foot, his female companion glided on top of a streetlight, somehow managing to avoid slipping up. There was something wrong with the way she moved, as if she had no weight at all. All Psychos were mutants, so she must have an abnormal physiology beneath the hazmat suit.

“I’m sorry but you make ice cream and blow off air,” Ryan pointed out. “Household products can do it. While I control the lynchpin of all reality. I try not to sound patronizing but…”

Ghoul unleashed a wide burst of white mist with a furious growl, freezing everything in its path.

Ryan simply activated his time-stop and dodged once again. Still, growing bored with the pursuit and now having an opening, he grabbed two of his throwing knives; launching one at Ghoul’s remaining eye, the other at Sarin.

When time resumed, Ghoul lost his remaining eye, and Sarin took a knife to the chest.

“You ain’t making it easy.”

Ryan stopped talking, however, when green gas came out of Sarin’s hazmat suit. The strange substance immediately rusted the streetlight below the Psycho, causing the electrical parts to short-circuit and the metal to slowly bend. Sarin put a hand on the opening, trying to keep the gas inside.

He knew she was full of hot air.

“I’ll kill you…” Ghoul whined, his face now looking like a strawberry sorbet with all the frozen blood flowing from his skull. It was vaguely horrifying, but Ryan had seen worse. “I’ll kill you…”

“Ghoul, I know the sight of my dashing costume and my long, bloody bat made you fall for me at first sight,” Ryan taunted him. “Trust me, I get that a lot. But I just don’t see you that way.”

I swear it,” rasped the abominable ice cream, his hands on his face, “If you crack a

the cold shoulder?” Ryan chuckled, unable to

his body swallowed by white mist. The strange substance

tall titan of ice and snow. This strange fusion between a

“Oh.”

of the elemental construct shattered the concrete and shook the ground. Sarin meanwhile, was too busy trying to cover

work? Ice didn’t

step. Something heavy

manifesting a sword of

guys paid them off?” Ryan asked, dodging another strike from Ghoul. He wondered how the Psycho

first cut the streetlight on which Sarin stood. Miss Chernobyl glided to the

moving at great speeds in spite of the heaviness of his armor, he cut through the giant snowman’s leg like a turkey, slicing it clean in half. Yet the limb quickly reattached itself to the body, Zanbato having to step

aircraft echoed above them, Ryan raising his eyes to watch an attack helicopter fly above the parking lot. He recognized

bank notes at

responded with

didn’t use laser weapons; he was fast, but not as much as light. When time resumed, he quickly realized that the Private Security targeted everyone, the

snowman form took the projectiles

Hazmat girl moved a hand to cover the hole in her suit, and the other towards the skies. A second later, she fired a blast straight at the helicopter, destroying its tail and sending it on a crash

gone on long enough.

gauntlet at Ryan, the courier stopped

to assess if he had to rescue the guards, only to notice a flying form next to the aircraft. A humanoid figure, nearly impossible to see in the darkness, and only visible due to the smoke blurring their features.

could focus on

of toxic fumes hanging in the

compressed air head-on. Physics being physics, the ice construct exploded in a rain of droplets and shards, a helpless Ghoul

the time to

“Blow this.”

introduced her to

by leaping to the side, as the holes in her mask unleashed a stream of gas; like a balloon, Miss hazmat flew towards the horizon at full speed, unable

the gas rusted the pistons into scrap within seconds. Yeah, sure, he could have ended it a lot sooner by gutting them in

wasn’t about winning. It was about having

she dead?” Zanbato asked, upon

realizing he couldn’t see

He never dies, even

too?” Ryan

him in more pieces than a birthday cake and tossed the head into the sea.” Zanbato glanced at the space where Sarin had blasted the Private Security’s helicopter. The machine had crashed into the Mediterranean Sea, the mysterious superhero gone. “Luigi’s team has already

already hear his self-driven Plymouth

can move by itself?” Zanbato