Chapter 6 - Freedom

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<Japan Shizuoka 13:12>

Winston was lying on the couch in the living room with the TV on, they seemed to be playing some villain broadcast but Winston wasn't paying attention to the TV.

His mind was searching for some way to improve his latest invention: The Slipstream.

David had told him that he wouldn't be able to help him for a while due to his business as a senior representative of I-Island and that this year's I-Expo was getting closer and closer which filled his hands with work. Winston doesn't blame him, in his opinion David has already done too much for him and the last thing he wants to do is bother him with this.

Which left Winston alone to figure out a way to make the Slipstream more compact and efficient. He recently realized that Lena's Entropic Energy is very unstable and the Slipstream can only hold so much energy at once.

'What a joy that synthetic food exists... although I shouldn't let Lena eat too much of that tasteless food.' Winston thought absently.

He wasn't particularly worried about Lena's problem with speech and writing, he can always teach it to her again and knowing how quick Lena is to learn things, it's only a matter of time.

"I guess my current priority is to compact, optimize and improve the slipstream..." muttered Winston to himself. "I should also install some language learning programs, it's better to start with the language problem sooner rather than later..."

Letting out a sigh, he got up from the couch and headed to the kitchen where he prepared an absurd amount of food before heading down to the basement with it.

He made his way to Lena's capsule before opening it with his optical print. Inside the capsule he could see a single person bed, a small couch, a table with two chairs, a small space set apart from everything else which it was easy to intuit was the bathroom, as well as a bookshelf full of books and a small television.

Winston turned his gaze to the brown-haired girl who was lying on the bed reading a book about.... robotics? okey that was unexpected.

'Can she read yet?...no, by the look on her face she's trying to forcefully figure out the letters.' Winston thought with a tired little laugh. "Hey Lena, I brought you lunch!"

Lena startled a little before she put the book aside and looked at her father, then looked at the food with stars in her eyes.

'It's a nuisance that her Quirk runs on calories, her being in this state is like her Quirk is active at all times which makes her go hungry much faster than other people... I theorize that if I manage to optimize the Energy flowing into the Slipstream and suppress the Entropic Energy leaks I could reduce the constant hunger she feels, with this she should also be able to go back to using her Quirk normally but much more limited'. Winston thought as he hugged Lena who had gotten up to hug her father.

Lena pulled away from her father before heading towards the table with a smile. It was only then that Winston realized that Lena had snatched the entire mountain of food from him without him noticing.

Winston simply shook his head and watched Lena eat with a disapproving look. "Lena, manners, you look like an animal!"

Lena simply pouted at him before eating like a civilized person, hungry, but civilized.

'You turn into a big gorilla with your Quirk dad! You are the animal not me!' Lena thought with a pout on her face.

Winston could only smile wryly before exiting the pod and heading to his computer, opening a 3D creation application that worked exclusively for the creation of electronic devices, Winston opened the plans for the Slipstream 4.0 Prototype and began to modify it.

Winston sighed knowing the hours it would take to find a good design for the big machine. "It's going to be a busy few months....".

***

The U.S. Department of Technology and Science was quite excited due to David and Winston's recent discoveries about Entropy, some of the scientists were beginning to try to understand Entropic Energy, and whether it was possible to use it to create various phenomena that at the time were mere fantasy, e.g. time travel, slowing down aging, reviving the dead by reversing their time, etc.

These ideas alone made almost the entire American scientific community excited and fought tooth and nail to see who would be the first to obtain the desired results, unaware that the other nations were watching their research, especially two scientists named, Moira O'Deorain and Angela Ziegler, each for different reasons...

In the end, no scientist was able to make any discoveries due to a constant energy source of Entropic Energy. The projects were quickly discarded or classified as top secret, after all, it would be chaos if mankind managed to get its hands on something as complex as Time.

***

<Japan Shizuoka 10:24> <3 Years Later>

Winston was at that moment using a 3D creation machine to create an artifact, said artifact wasn't very big, but it wasn't exactly small either, it looked like some sort of chest armor, only this one had a strange circle in the center that seemed to be off. The strange armor, which was too unprotected to be armor, was painted a white and gray color with black leather straps and so that it wouldn't bother the person wearing it, inside it had a special blend of cloth and cotton processed by a specialist's Quirk to ensure the armor's comfort.

"At last... it's ready!!!" Winston exclaimed excited that he could finally finish creating a compact and functional Slipstream, all previous attempts were a complete failure, in fact, this is attempt number 69.

Carefully picking up the device with trembling hands, he lifted it as if it were something very fragile and precious. Winston's veins burned with excitement as he carefully contemplated the New Slipstream.

After years of retirement as a scientist, after so long, he once again felt that sense of accomplishment of creating something that made him proud. He wasn't proud of creating the various artifacts for the U.S. or when he made the capsule for Lena, at that time he was just desperate not to lose his daughter, and after learning that she was "okay" he finally collapsed from exhaustion.

Shaking his head to disperse the memories he began to slowly walk back to the capsule where Lena had been living for the past three years.

Lena was able to write and speak English quickly thanks to Winston's help, but it took her about a year to relearn to speak and write Japanese from scratch, lately she was thinking about whether she should learn another language besides these two.

During these years Lena has been doing various things besides relearning languages. With Winston's supervision, she was able to use 'Acceleration' and 'Recoil' again after a while, though these expended an abysmal amount of energy, possibly due to Slipstream and her current state.

Using all the free time she had due to, well, it's not like she could get out of the pod without becoming a ghost.... She was able to find various ways to distract herself, like playing some video game or reading some book, but if anything she has been doing very frequently is: Exercise.

For some reason she seems to really like it and Winston wasn't particularly against it, and while it's not a good idea to let an 8 year old do rigorous exercise, Lena's Secondary Quirks seemed to act to keep Lena from permanently damaging herself and gaining real benefits, even Winston was surprised when he ran the analysis on his computer.

Winston opened the door to the capsule, inside was Lena on a treadmill at high speed, around her could be seen some other things such as several dumbbells, a treadmill for squats, etc.

After hearing the pod door open Lena stopped the treadmill and took a sip of water before turning to look at her father.

"Hi! I'd give you a hug but I'm sweaty..." Lena replied with a dazzling smile.

Lena had grown quite a bit in the last few years, she was quite tall for an 8 year old (141cm). She wore her hair short on end, she didn't like having it long because according to her it was a pain to have to spend hours combing it. She was quite fit thanks to the exercise she had done in the last year.

Actually there was another reason why Lena was exercising, the reason is... an effect of her own Quirk, you see, you probably noticed that despite being only 8 years old Lena is abnormally tall for a girl of her age, this is because her Quirk was slowing down her growth.

Lena could well live to be 120 years old or more and still look only 20 years old.

To anyone listening this may sound like a blessing of Eternal Youth, but in truth it is not, your body would be out of sync and various side effects would occur, cancer, nausea, memory lapses, optical and auditory illusions... and the list went on and on.

To solve this unexpected problem David proposed to use the Entropic Energy in a slightly more creative way. It was decided to use the Entropic Energy against itself, instead of slowing down the growth it should speed it up so that it would stabilize.

The problem... they didn't take into account that the Entropic Energy was especially unstable and unpredictable.

The result: well, they managed to slow down Lena's time, yes, but in return every time she uses Entropic Energy anyway she advances/alters her natural growth a bit.

Winston and David were surprised, but since the scans showed nothing dangerous in the long run so they just shrugged and took it as a win.

...although Lena didn't particularly like that her body looked like that of a 12-year-old...

Winston smiled good-naturedly as he tried in vain to hide the Slipstream. "Don't worry, how's the exercise going?".

"Not bad! I can run about 30 kilometers before I drop down exhausted.... what's that?" replied Lena as she took another sip of water before pointing her finger at the device in Winston's arms.

Winston walked over to Lena before showing her the device with a smile. "Surprise! I brought you a present...one that you can finally get out of these walls with!"

Lena's jaw dropped to the floor. "Is this-"

Winston nodded with a warm smile, Lena could almost feel the tears threatening to fall from her face as she reached out a hand to grab the device.

She was about to grab the new Slipstream, but-

"First go take a bath, I'm not going to let you touch this with your sweaty hands" Her father told her sternly, leaving her pouting but too excited at the prospect of going out to see the sun to reply, so she headed for the bathroom for a quick shower.

After a few minutes she emerged from the bathroom dressed in casual clothes, a beige t-shirt and orange shorts.

With Winston's help, Lena put on the new Slipstream... although it was a little heavy, it was nothing Lena couldn't handle.

"First redirect the energy from the old Slipstream to the new one..."

Lena nodded before closing her eyes, the sounds of the world had completely disappeared.

Only her and a strange sensation that covered her entire body remained, the sensation expanding to a particular location, to what Lena knew was the Old Slipstream.

Taking a deep breath, she moved the whole sensation to the New Slipstream in an instant.

FUUUUUUMMMMM!!!

With a great sound, the circle in the middle of the Slipstream lit up in a light blue color, above it was projected a small circle with varying lines.

Lena suddenly felt her a chain she didn't know she had break.

When she was linked to the Old Slipstream, she felt like there was a barrier she couldn't cross... but now that barrier was gone.

Lena couldn't help but get emotional and shed a few tears, Winston simply gave her a gentle hug to his daughter who could finally see the world anew....

After a few long minutes, they finally separated from the embrace with Winston wiping away Lena's tears of happiness.

Winston just smiled softly before explaining the new features of the Slipstream: "As you can see, the new model is much more comfortable and smaller than the old one, it's also more optimized for everyday use so you should have no problems with it."

Explained Winston going into his scientific mode speaking slowly. Lena paid the utmost attention to her father she was not going to repeat the same mistake that had cost her so much and hurt her father.

"What if the Slipstream is destroyed or damaged?" asked Lena cocking her head to the side, but in the back of her mind she already knew the answer.

"You... well, you'll come back from dematerializing and out of sync with the present, essentially you'll go back to being a ghost" replied Winston frowning as he saw what Lena feared come true. "I installed an emergency signal that would alert me to where you were last if the Slipstream is destroyed."

After further briefing Lena on the Slipstream they finally both left the basement.

Lena felt especially nostalgic seeing the house again after so long, it felt unreal and the nostalgia almost made her cry again.

Winston led her to the backyard of the house, opening the door they could see a small yard with grass and a few flowers of various colors.

The weather was perfect, the clouds were clear and there was a bright sun in the sky along with a refreshing breeze.

Winston was the first to step out onto the garden while Lena just watched from the door frame, Winston was confused as to why Lena wasn't moving but he could see her hand was shaking slightly so he decided to take her by the hand to calm her down and slowly led her outside.

Lena felt like she was in some kind of dream, she felt like this was all just something from her imagination to keep her sane from all those years of confinement or just a trick of her head.

But it seemed real... the grass, the flowers, the wind, the sun's rays..... everything.

It seemed natural...

Without Lena noticing, tears began to stream down her face as she stared at the sun.

Winston stroked her head as he hugged her silently.

Only after feeling the warmth in her father's embrace did Lena understand that she wasn't dreaming, that this was all reality and that she wasn't going to disappear from one moment to the next.....

At last she was free.

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