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.

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

minutes, maybe hours. During that period, nothing else mattered; not Dad, not

of bulky bathysphere. She had somehow painted it red, and even incorporated a hammer

nature, almost intuitively.

Water.

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.

made her wonder if the Elixir granted powers based on the drinker’s personality,

its wonders,

didn’t even understand how his unique biology worked, let alone how to deal with his insanity! She could make submarines, tsunami machines, water-control devices, but nothing that could help her understand Elixirs, let alone the madness

“Len.”

stepping inside the garage while still in his pajamas. He glanced at the mini-sub,

said, her voice breaking. “I

no condemnation in his gaze, only

bench. The creative surge had left her exhausted

Ryan, who offered her a warm smile. “Hey,” he said, pointing at

joke came out of nowhere but made Len laugh. “You’re horrible,” she replied, the tension

that will only be a

smirked, “We could travel. I can

the lodge’s door open from the outside, the

echoed through the lodge alongside the lightning, Ryan’s hand tensing on Len’s shoulder.

overtaking his voice. “You have to

sadly. “There’s nowhere to

the homeless are revolting again! They killed my

footprints behind, Ryan had moved in front of Len. The Psycho observed his

Dad’s behavior had suddenly changed from warm to tense.

“Dad…”

I sensing in your

shining armor protecting her from a furious dragon. But for all his bravery,

his fingers turning into claws. “You lied to

She suddenly felt so small, the world

meant for me! Don’t you understand, you stupid daughter? I took it for you! I took it to protect you! Protect you

know…” the Genius apologized, lowering

was her fault. If she had been strong… if she had been strong, Dad wouldn’t have had to take those potions and transform into

responsibility! Mine!” Dad calmed himself, but

“Dad, please…”

the Psycho, but Bloodstream simply slapped him out of the way with a

her eyes and didn’t resist. She

But it never came.

within an inch of his daughter’s

fighting a headache. “No… not her… not Len… I can’t… I can control it…

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

recovered from the slap, Len extending a hand to help get back on his feet. “You’re okay?” she asked with concern. He had blood falling from his nose; not

although clearly shaken.

were very brave,” she tried to cheer him up, blushing a bit. “It was

with words, he

It was a kiss born of hunger, of a

It felt…

It felt good.

the fear and tension, it

space between each other. Whether it was out of fear of discovery or