Riding on her underpowered scooter, Ella couldn’t help but marvel at what lay before her. Lush greenery covered the landscape, dotted with well-maintained trees, and carved with stone pathways. In the distance, sat in the middle of the island, was The Genesis Empowerment Center’s main building, a state-of-the-art, ten-story circular structure made of glass and steel. Enclosed bridges sprouted from the building and connected to shorter but much wider sub-buildings. She rode away from the building towards the parking lot.
The pathways were busy with people coming and going. She even spotted agents standing guard at different spots. The complex ended up being so large and daunting that she had to study the map sprung up on signposts.
The C wing.
The Registration and Assessment wing, better known as the C wing, served as the name would have it; facilitating the registration process for superhumans and assessing the scope of their superhuman powers and abilities. Stepping in, Ella found a short queue. It was not what she expected, considering the hold-up earlier. The woman in front of her spun around and introduced herself.
“Hi hon,” she said. “Dare I say, I love your afro hairdo. Can I touch it?”
Ella raised an eyebrow.
The woman burst into laughter. “I’m just kidding. The look on your face was priceless. I’m Rebecca. You are?”
Rebecca was blonde-haired with pink tips and a bright smile. She wore floral patterned leggings and an oversized knitted sweater that almost looked comical on her small frame.
“I’m Ella,” she said. “Since it’s so chilly in here, I’m sure both of us can squeeze into that sweater of yours.”
Rebecca looked wide-eyed at her, then laughed once more. “I see you can give as much as you take, huh?” Then she pointed at the blonde-haired teen in line, facing away from them. “This is my brother, Caleb. He’s a bit shy, as you can see.”
“No, I’m not,” Caleb said, his voice as deep as a baritone. “I’m just focused on the task at hand.”
The siblings received name tags and were ushered into an adjacent waiting room. She had to complete a form since she didn’t do it online. It spurred her to detail her personal information like her name, when she unlocked her powers, and the nature of said powers. Rebecca waved her over when she stepped into the waiting room, where about ten people, excluding her, were in attendance. Once again, the low numbers shocked her, in stark difference to the hassle it took to get inside the complex. Perhaps The Genesis Empowerment Center served many other uses. It made sense regarding the superhumans present as she could count on one hand the number of superhumans she encountered in her life.
“Not that many people,” Rebecca said. “So we should be out in a breeze.”
“That’s because few people are superhumans,” Caleb said, his attention on the game on his phone. “Last time I checked, about 300,000 superhumans exist in the country. A 1 to 1100 ratio of superhumans to humans.”
Rebecca hugged her brother. “You see? I told you that you’re special. No matter what powers you have.”
“Oh, please. Bug the new girl.” He pushed her away.
“So, what powers do you have, Ella? If you’re okay with sharing,” Rebecca asked.
“That’s fine with me,” Ella replied. “I can talk to birds.”
Caleb snickered.
“Caleb! That’s not nice,” Rebecca said. “Sorry about that, Ella.”
Caleb shrugged, barely holding in a mocking laugh. “Why? I mean, here I thought my powers were weak, but talking to birds? That takes the cake.”
“Caleb!”
“It’s okay, Rebecca.” Ella was suddenly interested in what Caleb’s powers were. “What are your powers, anyway? The both of you.”
Rebecca’s mood perked up. “So I can manipulate light molecularly while my boneheaded brother can mimic any sound.”
Wow, those are some cool powers.
Ella glanced at Caleb, just now understanding the reasons for his combative nature. It felt similar to her brother when he first entered high school. Jalen’s recurring wish to Santa every Christmas was to be granted powers. Flashy powers were his preference. So when high school came, and he didn’t show any signs of being superhuman, his demeanor grew angrier. He lashed out, broke things, and became a genuine concern for his teachers. Until he matured and subsequently mellowed out. Ella could see those signs in Caleb. Unlike Jalen, though, Caleb ended up with powers at a young age. Powers that were probably far off from what he dreamed about.
One after the other, the staff admitted the superhumans, including the siblings. Ella went in last, allowed into a medium-sized room with hospital decor like a bed, desk, and chairs. There was even a Snellen Chart on the wall. She made herself comfortable in the chair. Minutes later, a lanky man with a withered face and scruffy white beard, dressed in a lab coat, walked in and sat opposite her.
“Just a moment, please,” the man said, rigorously typing into his computer. “There… we are. I am Dr. Yefremov, and I’ll be conducting your registration. And if necessary, an assessment as well.”
“What do you mean? I heard you always did physical assessments.”
“Not anymore, young lady. We only do that when an individual is special. You didn’t hear that from me, anyway. State your name, age, and birth date. You know the drill.”
Ella gave all the relevant information. Regardless, sometimes it proved hard to comprehend the heavily accented words of the doctor. When Dr. Yefremov asked how her powers manifested, she gave the answer Jalen and herself concocted. There was absolutely no way she was revealing her god physiology. Even though she had yet to see her powers manifest, until today.
“One night I drank too much to drink and blacked out. I woke up the next day suffering a heavy hangover and found out I had powers.”
“That’s quite the origin story,” Dr. Yefremov chuckled. “If you ever become a superhero, we’ll have to change that. So, what powers do you possess?”
“I can talk to birds. Probably other animals as well, but I haven’t tried.”
“I see.”
When the doctor finished typing, he entered another room that Ella had just noticed. Then, he emerged with his hands and face covered, a sealed syringe and a plastic vial in his grasp.
“Okay, so I’m just going to take a sample of your blood. Then you can be on your way,” Dr. Yefremov said.
Ella rolled her eyes.
I guess I don’t get any special treatment, huh?
She let the doctor draw her blood. Though, it seemed he was taking his time because the pressure of a finger rather than a needle was all she felt on her arm.
“That’s weird,” Dr. Yefremov remarked, his face lighting up. “Perhaps there is more to you than you know. I can’t pierce your skin. Hold on.”
The doctor disappeared into the room again. This time he re-emerged holding a syringe with a blue needle.
Dr. Yefremov smiled, his excitement prominent now. “This needle, Ms. Nkanga, is coated with carium, a metal that serves as the Achilles’ heel to you, superhumans. You might feel tingles on your skin like your muscles are arresting. However, that is only temporary.”
Repeating his steps, only this time with a crooked smile fixed on his face, the doctor tried to draw Ella’s blood.
“What?” Dr. Yefremov burst into wheezing laughter. Then he pressed a button on his desk and spoke. “Prepare an assessment test for the subject, Ella Nkanga.”
Ella smirked. “So am I special now?”
“Oh, yes, Ms. Nkanga. Special barely scratches the surface of describing what you are. Carium has no effect on you. Do you know how many superhumans in the country can attest to that?”
“Uh, no…”
“Follow me.”
Dr. Yefremov left the room, Ella quickly following behind him. Unlike before, where she passed through public hallways, this time, with Dr. Yefremov at the helm, staff-only areas were open to them. All courtesy of the doctor’s key card and eye being scanned. Into an elevator, they went, and deep down in the basement, they emerged.
They entered the third room to the right of a well-lit corridor. A woman with a heavily defined musculature stood up to greet Dr. Yefremov, then with her beady eyes, she regarded her. Ella noted a long scar wrapped around the woman’s jaw.
“Is she the one?” the woman asked.
“Yes,” Dr. Yefremov replied. “Ms. Nkanga, this is agent Ivarsson. She’ll be conducting your assessment. Agent Harrell is the gentleman currently seated.”
Harrell waved a hand, his attention fully on his computer. The room was fairly large, equipped with advanced treadmills, lifting weights, and various other machines utterly foreign to her. Ivarsson handed her a document and a pen.
“Just a consent and disclosure form,” Ivarsson said. Seeing the confused look on Ella’s face, she added. “It tells us that you fully understand and agree to participate in the assessment test.”
She read through the document thoroughly. Her mother’s situation had imbued in her the need to read anything before signing her name. And she kept to that religiously, after making the grave mistake of signing on to take her mother’s debt. One part stuck out to her. It was about them not being liable for any potential risks during the test.
“What potential risks are involved?” she asked.
“Nothing you can’t handle if you are as good as Dr. Yefremov thinks you are,” Ivarsson said.
She signed after further deliberation. If it proved too dangerous for her, she could always back out.
“Good.” Agent Ivarsson smiled after retrieving the form. “Tom, hook her up.”
Harrell handed her a change of clothes consisting of a tight sleeveless jersey and shorts, then ushered her into a nearby room to change. Inspecting the jersey closely, she spotted circular hard points that stuck to her skin with holes in the middle. After changing, Harrell brought her over to a treadmill, then hooked up some wires to those hard points.
The agent, seeing her apprehensive look, said. “These are biometric sensors. We’ll use them to measure your vital signs, such as heart rate, blood pressure, and respiratory rate.”
She looked at the female agent since Harrell was inserting wires into various parts of her body. “Shouldn’t you have switched places?”
“Why?” Ivarsson asked. “Scared of a little contact? Tom doesn’t bite.”
Once Harrell was done, he returned to his seat behind his computer. Dr. Yefremov sat beside the agent.
Ivarsson continued. “Now, it’s pretty simple, Ms. Nkanga. You will warm up for fifteen minutes on the treadmill, then when I give the command, you run as hard and as fast as your legs can muster. Do you need water, energy drinks, smoothies, vitamins, or protein shakes before we begin?”
Ella raised an eyebrow. “No, but I’d kill for some breast milk right about now. That’s what gives me the most nutrients.”
Agent Ivarsson stifled a laugh. “Well, you never know. With the generation these days, I had to ask.”
She hopped onto the treadmill, all worries and nervousness draining from her. Next, she began slow and steady, barely faster than her walking pace. Ivarsson advised her to keep that pace. The goal was to loosen her muscles, after all. She was not a fit woman, her daily schedule involving riding to work and back. The only exercise she got was the hours spent standing and serving customers. So it came as a shock when she barely broke a sweat, jogging for fifteen minutes straight.
“Run Mrs. Nkanga. Run,” Ivarsson commanded.
At the sound of the agent’s assertive voice, she sped up; the treadmill responding to her. Her legs felt powerful as they pounded into the ground. Air flooded easily into her lungs, which supplied her blood with enough oxygen that her breathing remained steady, like she was lounging in a chair, watching a horror movie. Definitely not as if she was running as fast as she possibly could.
“Keep your back straight and head steady,” Ivarsson said. “Good, good. That’s it. Tom, talk to me.”
“She has been maintaining an average speed of sixty-seven miles per hour for about twenty minutes now. Her heart rate has barely risen. Her oxygen saturation levels are operating at full capacity. The ECG waveform of her heart is truly outstanding. No issues, Karoline.”
“Good. Keep it up, Ms. Nkanga.”
At the speeds she was running, her legs spent more time in the air than the ground. The minutes climbed on, but other than the sweat coating her forehead and other areas, she showed no signs of fatigue.
“Ok, stop there, Ms. Nkanga,” Ivarsson said. “I can’t have you running all day. How long was that, Tom?”
“For one hour, twenty minutes, she ran at seventy-two miles per hour.”
Dr. Yefremov roared with laughter. “She was getting faster? I can’t believe it.”
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