Li:
1999
The lab hummed with anticipation as I prepared my experiment. Radon—the elusive gas—swirled within the glass chamber. Dr. Aurelius, our brilliant but arthritis-afflicted professor, watched me with curiosity. Why he, in his early thirties, suffered from such an ailment remained a mystery.
“Radon,” I said to Ferris, my voice steady. “It’s used to treat arthritis. Why not here?”
Ferris, my lab partner, stood beside me. We had become friends, our conversations fueled by curiosity and shared wonder. But there was something more—a chemistry beyond the periodic table.
“We could have something more,” I thought, watching Ferris mix chemicals. But love was a volatile element, prone to explosions. And I carried radon—one of the most unstable of them all.
The explosion came without warning. Radon swirled around me, a tempest of possibility. I reached out, hoping to cure Dr. A’s arthritis. My eyes let out a faint glow.
And then I was gone.
Not vanished but extinguished. My body lay still, eyes closed, lips parted as if about to reveal a secret. The lab officials arrived, sealing the area off. They muttered about containment breaches, about the risks of elemental experimentation. But they didn’t understand.
Suddenly, I heard footsteps. “Alithea?! Oh, no…”
It was my roommate, Ethylene, who wielded the organic compound power to ripen fruit. “E? What are you—” I muttered weakly.
“They’re probably gonna take you away and experiment on you, Alithea…” she replied, heading straight to the point. “Ferris and everyone else thinks you’re dead. But we have to escape to the room. Come on, I’ll just freeze time real quick and heal you,” she said, simultaneously using her carbon-14 and oxygen at once. We ran into our room, worried and scared.
As soon as I entered, Ethylene closed the door, leaving only us inside. Nobody could get in and nobody could exit. “Do you trust me?" she asked, in a firm tone.
“Y-yeah, but…”
Next thing I knew, Ethyl did something with her powers. Her eyes lit up, and a great light enveloped the room. The light eventually concentrated itself around me, and I found myself inside a bubble for the next 25 years, trapped in a little book. My diary.
The perfect artifact for an unassuming group of friends to stumble across and free me.
ns 15.158.61.48da2
