Bianca farted all the way back to the Mechron submarine.

Proverbially of course, but Ryan couldn’t help but laugh at the sound she made each time she switched between gaseous and human form. Now, she was doing a live demonstration to the courier and the Carnival members deep in the submarine’s mess. Most of the group sat around white tables, while Mr. Wave prepared cocktails behind a short counter.

Bianca’s body, clothes included, turned into an orange cloud with a snap of her fingers. Unlike her time as a Psycho, the substance reminded Ryan more of faint colored mist than thick, toxic chemicals. When she touched the thrumming metal walls of the submarine, they didn’t corrode into dust.

Ryan looked at his traveling circus. Leo Hargraves had taken back his sexy, handsome human form, and didn’t hide his joy. Stitch scribbled notes on a journal. Matty kept his arms crossed with skepticism, and their new recruit, the Panda, acclaimed Bianca with his paws.

“So?” Bianca asked as she returned to her human form, her cloud coalescing into flesh, hair, and clothes. Terrible clothes, by the way. How could she live with herself wearing only shaggy jeans and a tank top the courier would never understand.

“So I will introduce you to your lord and savior, Wardrobe,” Ryan replied. “I can’t, in good conscience, let you run around dressed like that.”

“Still better than a hazmat suit,” the young woman snickered, searching her pockets for a cigarette and a lighter.

“The corrosive aspect of the gas was probably the result of synergy,” Dr. Stitch said. “Now your powers act independently. You can switch back and forth between solid and gaseous, yes, and your chemical compound no longer degrades metallic material.”

“I ain’t going to rust any metal tool I get my hands on?” Bianca asked with a scoff, causing her cigarette to vibrate. Unlike her Orange power, the Red one worked shockingly the same. “Yeah, I won’t miss that part. Might need to change my name though.”

“May I suggest Lady Flatulence?” Ryan asked mirthfully.

Instead of pinching him, his former Vice-President answered with a joke of her own. “Only if you change your name to Butthole,” she said. “Wouldn’t we make quite the pair then?”

“How about Ass and Fart? You intoxicate them, I smother them. We will call our new superhero team ‘The Cheeks.’”

“Better than ‘The Buttkissers.’”

“Sifu, could I join?” the Panda asked enthusiastically.

“Of course,” Ryan replied. “I shall grant you the honorable name of Ass-Kicker!”

Shroudy Matty kept his arms crossed. Though he had championed the treatment for the Psycho condition, seeing it in action filled him with doubt now. “I hope you all understand what this discovery means,” he said. “While it is preferable to having a psychopath with two powers, this means anyone can technically receive two powers now. The number of would-be Augustus wannabes will increase.”

“I doubt so,” Sunshine replied with optimism. “With Eva Fabre dead and her facility destroyed, nobody can make true Elixirs. Once the Mechron bases are destroyed and Dynamis is dealt with, Knockoffs will become a thing of the past.”

“Never say never, Sunshine,” Ryan replied, knowing that someone could always develop the right power to make more of them. “But I agree. The Elixir well will eventually dry up, and the problem with Lightning Butt isn’t the fact he has two powers. It’s what those two powers can do combined.”

Sunshine nodded in agreement. “Invulnerability and his destructive lightning make Augustus a danger to human civilization, but among the thousands of Psychos we encountered, only Bloodstream possesses a truly cataclysmic power combination. There will always be the likes of Mechron and Adam the Ogre, Psycho condition or not.”

“Point taken,” Shroud conceded.

“Considering the data we gathered and the projections on the Elixir distribution,” Stitch said, “Elixirs will more or less vanish from circulation within ten years. New Genomes afterward will be born, rather than made.”

The Elixirs that remained would be like buried treasures lost to time. The Alchemist had planned for Genomes to overcome Homo Sapiens, and they would do so. With a stable genetic code, former Psychos will also be able to reproduce, bolstering the new breed’s numbers further.

“I won’t speak for all Psychos out there.” Bianca lit her cigarette and enjoyed the taste of incoming lung cancer. “But I ain’t starting any more trouble, unless the nerd asks me too.”

“Moi?” Ryan asked, switching between his native tongue and French.

“You gave me my life back, jackass,” she replied. “I owe you a debt I can’t ever repay. Whatever you want from me, you’ll get it. But I’ll still punch you in the arm if you push your luck.”

“Would you submit to a trial?” Leo Hargraves asked.

“Yeah... yeah, I guess I would.” Bianca let out a cloud of smoke from her nostrils. “Will I be convicted?”

“Your crimes are nowhere near as severe as Adam or Psyshock, and you helped us a great deal,” Sunshine replied with wisdom. “I believe in second chances. Your captured teammates will be treated the same.”

“Only Geniuses with our resources and combined expertise can make this cure work though, sir,” Stitch pointed out. “We will need support to expand it across Europe.”

“Nidhogg’s?” Shroud asked.

“Dynamis’?” Ryan replied jokingly. “Get the best privatized healthcare in the world? Which isn’t saying much.”

His transparent teammate grumbled, as if a pigeon had assaulted his windshield. “They already have the infrastructure, Ryan, but none of the ethics required.”

“We could work with Enrique Manada, but not the rest of his family,” Leo Hargraves replied. “There is still time to think about the future. Let us first cure the Meta-Gang members in captivity, and see if the treatment sticks.”

Ryan left his allies to debate how to mass-produce the cure to sit behind the mess’ bar counter. Mr. Wave gave him a purple cocktail, with a tasteful blue drinking straw. “What is this?” the courier asked.

“This is the Virgin Wavemojito,” Mr. Wave pitched the cocktail. “Mr. Wave can make people drunk on non-alcoholic beverages.”

Ryan took a sip, closing his eyes in pleasure as the taste washed over his mouth. Such a perfect mix of grape juice, honey, and so many secret things! His idol’s exquisite tastes didn’t stop at fashion. “Delicious.”

“Mr. Wave only accepts the best,” the Genome replied, a hand on the counter. “The Sun told Mr. Wave that you wanted to talk to him?”

“Yes, I did.” The noise of their allies’ debate drowned Ryan’s voice, as he dropped the bomb without warning. “I’m a time-traveler.”

The courier expected questions, but Mr. Wave was too good for that. “One cannot travel through time. Time waits for Mr. Wave, but only after he counts to infinity. And when Mr. Wave kills time, it stays dead.”

“Obviously,” Ryan replied. “Do you remember the day we met? You saved me from an explosion.”

The superhero joined his hands. “Mr. Wave has had that pleasure, yes.”

“You saved my life more than twenty times,” Ryan said, as he sipped the cocktail. “I lost count afterward. Sometimes I tripped, sometimes I dived down. You couldn’t save me all the time, but you always at least tried. When I die, I often remember the feeling of your cashmere suit pressing against my face to shield me from the flames.”

Mr. Wave listened in respectful silence, his wavelength head lacking anything like facial expressions.

“You were always present when I woke up,” Ryan continued his tale. “Sitting at my bedside, as if you had a responsibility towards me.”

“Mr. Wave had one,” the man replied. “If Mr. Wave had seen you earlier, you wouldn’t have ended up in the hospital in the first place.”

“If you had, you would all be dead.” And Ryan himself too. “Whenever I woke up, you always tried to help me in any way you could. At one point, you even toured all of Italy’s coastline at lightspeed to try and find Len.”

“There is no lightspeed. Light travels at Mr. Wave’s pace.” The colorful Genome’s voice turned from amused to serious. “Why did you run away, Ryan?”

“I wasn’t in the right state of mind,” the courier admitted. “You know the five stages of grief? I think I was stuck at the depression part for… thirty years? At least twenty. Took me a stay in Monaco to reach acceptance and enjoy the ride.”

“Mr. Wave has discussed this with Simon. You saved a great many souls from a terrible place, Ryan.”

“Yes, but it took a while. These guys needed a hero to get them out of hell, and… well, when I tried to think of one, you were the first that came to mind. My parents died when I was young, and Bloodstream was no one’s idea of a parental model.”

“Mr. Wave can imagine.”

“So I guess I tried to become a little more like you,” the time-traveler said, letting the truth off his chest. “I want to say thank you. You inspired me in my darkest moments, and I owe you my life more than ten times over.”

“You owe me nothing, Ryan,” Mr. Wave replied, his tone almost paternal. “I am proud of you. I’ve been keeping up with your adventures when I could, and you have saved more lives than you think.”

This made the courier’s head perk up. “You did?”

“Yes, though I wonder why you crashed a plane while making a delivery,” Mr. Wave replied with a shrug. “Even I didn’t go that far.”

“I swear, the alternative was worse!” Or at least Ryan hoped so, as he played with his drinking straw. He didn't fully remember that particular run, truth be told. “I thought the first person couldn’t contain your almighty power?”

“I was a comedian before I became a living spotlight,” Mr. Wave replied, breaking character. “Life on the road is hard. Out of our group’s newbies, one out of four usually dies before the mission is done. Leo still feels guilty about not being there to save the Costa family from Augustus, Mathias watched his mother become a vegetable, Ace has her own demons, and even the good doctor feels down sometimes. It’s depressing when you think about how fragile life is… so I make sure that my teammates never do it.”

Ryan sighed. “When everything goes to shit, the only way to go on is to laugh off the pain and power through.”

“Exactly. Someone has to carry on the show when everyone else feels down.” The living wavelength glanced at the Carnival, and most specifically at Bianca. “The challenges are different when you move from one-man shows to a troupe, but I think you’re doing very well for yourself.”

“I had my fill of one-man shows. I love the spotlight—”

“But you hate solitude more?” Mr. Wave guessed.

Ryan nodded. “You knew about the time-travel part.”

This made him laugh. “Only half of my boasts are exaggerations, Ryan,” he said. “I keep the real stuff secret, because nobody would believe them. I’ve seen way crazier things than time travel. Have you been to Quebec?”

“No, but I’ll probably invade Canada when I get elected president of the free world again.”

“Whatever you do, Ryan, don’t go to Quebec.”

Shortie’s voice echoed through the mess’ loudspeaker. “We’re approaching Italy’s coasts,” she said.

“Ooh, I will have phone coverage again!” Ryan said happily, leaping from his seat and leaving an empty glass behind. “Sorry, I need to call my girlfriend.”

“Mr. Wave understands. He has his fangirls too.” Mr. Wave raised an index at Ryan, like one of those ‘Uncle Sam wants you’ posters. “Don’t let her go, Ryan.”

He wouldn’t.

Ryan walked out of the mess and through the submarine’s metal corridors, making its way to the exit. No sooner did he open his phone, than he received a message from Livia.

LiviaLove: Ryan? Ryan, are you alright?