The Perfect Run

• Four years ago.

Len Sabino woke up on a mattress, the room cold, and chill. Water leaked from the wood ceiling, rain hitting the window. Thunder echoed in the distance, the storm getting closer. In spite of the noise, Ryan was soundly asleep next to her, snoring almost as loud as the lightning.

“Hey, Riri, you’re sleeping?” she whispered, but the boy didn’t offer any response. Ryan was kind of cute when he slept, and completely in denial about the snoring.

Len remembered the day she and her dad had found him, amidst the rubble of a village destroyed by marauders. He had hidden in the basement, while his whole community had perished, their livestock taken. If she hadn’t scavenged his house looking for supplies, Len may never have met Ryan.

They stuck together for years afterward, never far from the other. They survived the Wars, Dad’s rampages, marauders, and Genomes. Always together, even sharing the same bed. They were siblings in all but name… though she wished they could become more, even if she was too shy to say it out loud. She never had a boyfriend, didn’t understand how these things worked.

If only he would make the first move.

Len glanced around the room. It used to be some kind of hunting lodge near the Alps, a silent house of wood on a steep hillside. The locals must have abandoned it a few years ago, either chased away by marauders or moving towards the rebuilding cities for protection. Everybody spoke about New Rome, whenever she managed to talk to someone outside her family without Dad interfering.

When Ryan wouldn’t wake up, Len left the bed in her pajamas and searched the room. Her companion had left his pants on a chair, and while it wasn’t nice, the girl looked into his pockets.

The Blue Elixir seemed to shine, as lightning fell right outside the bedroom.

It had been weeks since they left Venice, and so far Dad hadn’t noticed the potions. He had left the kids alone three days ago, to salvage stuff nearby. She hoped he wouldn’t kill anyone this time.

Len knew her father would come back. Ryan wished he didn’t. He feared Dad, hated him.

Len understood. Dad was… difficult. He was already drinking a bit too much after Mom left them for her other family, but he always did his best to raise Len and her brother. When Cesare died during the bombing, something broke inside Dad and never came back. The Elixirs had just been the last straw that broke the camel’s back, making him take out his pain on others.

But in spite of everything, he was still her father.

Len observed the potion with a mix of fear and hope. She knew how Dad might react once she drank it, but… Blue Elixirs made people smarter. Geniuses. Mechron drank one, and he invented killer robots and orbital lasers.

If it gave her a smart power, maybe she could create a cure for Dad. Make him normal again. Turn their group into a real family, instead of… of whatever they were right now.

Len hesitated, briefly glanced at Ryan, then moved into another room of the lodge. The garage at the back.

The place was complete chaos, a storage area where the previous inhabitants put everything they got their hands on. Books, car parts, tools, lamps… even an old fridge and washing machine long out of use.

It had a workshop, however, perhaps used to skin hunted animals. Since electricity didn’t work, Len had to light up a candle to see and provide some warmth. She sat behind the workbench and examined the Elixir. The receptacle provided no notice, no information besides its helix symbol. It would be a leap into the unknown. A direct injection scared her, so she decided to ingest the substance directly. She had seen Dad do it before, so it should work.

Breathing long and deep, Len removed the syringe and drank the potion whole.

The substance tasted unlike anything she had ever felt. It mixed the texture of saltwater with alien flavors, neither sweet nor salty, neither acid nor bitter. The liquid had no natural component at all.

More strangely, the substance fused with her flesh. As she drank it, the Elixir vanished before it could move into her stomach; it went straight into her bloodstream through the tongue and mouth, bypassing the normal digestion process. In the span of seconds, Len had swallowed it whole.

For a few seconds, nothing happened. Len put the empty syringe on the workbench, wondering if something had gone wrong. Had age caused the Elixir to lose its potency?

And then her mind caught fire.

A manic surge of divine inspiration possessed Len, ideas flowing into her head. Raw, pure information filled her brain like a torrent of water breaking through a dam, expanding her neurons, changing her whole understanding of the universe. She couldn’t move, her consciousness freezing as it struggled to compute an enormous mass of new content.

Her body went numb, a surge of blue energy phasing through her nerves, her bones, her organs. It was brief but intense, her entire self altered on a fundamental level.

her power demanded to be used, like a baby wishing to be born into the world. As the blue light left her body, Len’s hands grabbed the remains of the fridge, the

that period, nothing else mattered;

and random stuff into some kind of bulky bathysphere. She had somehow

power’s nature, almost intuitively. It boiled down to one

Water.

land animals to survive below the waves. How to alter the ocean on a worldwide scale, how to make technology that resisted deep sea pressure, how to create devices capable of causing tsunamis. She knew what creatures lived in the darkest abysses of the planet, and how she could communicate with them. Her power provided her with all the information she

the sea and Jules Verne’s stories, it was almost a dream come true. It made her wonder if the Elixir granted powers based on the drinker’s personality, providing an ability that they

for all its wonders,

to cure him, even with her expanded intellect! She didn’t even understand how his unique biology worked, let alone how to deal with his insanity! She could make submarines, tsunami machines,

“Len.”

pajamas. He glanced at the mini-sub, then at the empty bottle; his mouth said nothing, but his eyes

to,” Len said, her voice

gaze, only worry. “Was it worth

head in defeat, crumbling on the bench. The creative surge

raised her head at Ryan, who offered her a warm smile. “Hey,” he said, pointing at the bathysphere. “It’s still beautiful. Now you can send fish to

horrible,”

both know that will

smirked, “We could travel. I can make a Nautilus from scrap

the lodge’s door open from the outside, the lock

Ryan’s hand tensing on Len’s shoulder.

Ryan said, panic overtaking his voice. “You

replied sadly. “There’s nowhere to

to leave, the homeless are revolting again! They killed my clone

Len. The Psycho observed his daughter without a word, the blood making up his

Dad’s behavior had suddenly changed from

“Dad…”

sensing in

her from a

angrily, his fingers turning

small, the world so cold

for you!” Dad snarled angrily. “It was for me! It was always meant for me! Don’t you understand, you stupid daughter? I took it for you! I took it to protect

apologized, lowering her

been strong, Dad wouldn’t have had to take

us, it was my responsibility! Mine!” Dad calmed himself, but the menace in his voice only grew. “You have to

“Dad, please…”

the Psycho, but Bloodstream simply slapped him out of the way with a furious backhand, sending the boy to the floor.

and didn’t

But it never came.

opened her eyes again, facing her father’s featureless visage. His claws within an inch of his daughter’s neck,

held his head with both hands, fighting a headache. “No… not her…

walked away from the garage, his last embers of humanity struggling against the Elixir addiction. Dad vanished inside the lodge, Len hearing him bang his head against a

feet. “You’re okay?” she asked with concern. He had blood falling from his nose; not Bloodstream’s, but

he said, although

brave,” she tried to cheer him up, blushing

with words, he kissed

It was a kiss born of hunger, of a primal desire for

It felt…

It felt good.

and

putting space between each other. Whether it