by The Eurostar
Call me the Eurostar. I'm fond of this name. My true name, though, is Edulcore Cicciotto. I'm a cook, here in Bologna, my city, Northern Italy, an ancient city whose palaces are made of red bricks, bricks made from the clay of the plain over which the city is built. A plain that is very cold in winter, wrapped in its mantle of dense, wet mist, and hot in summer, when the fields are burned by the sun.
My summer ended five years ago. I was known as Eurostar, and I was a speedster. Eurostar was only one of my nicknames, the one I like most. But the one most used by the public, by the press, was the White Marvel.
At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Seoul, Atlanta, I won everything: 100, 200, 400, 4x100. I could have won every other competition, right to the marathon, but it was impossible because the trials were at the same time, and I had to choose.
After so many years of the supremacy of the USA and African-American runners, I was the European answer. Unfortunately, I was also the answer that the racists of half the world were awaiting. But I didn't care, then. That was the summer of my life. I was famous, rich and happy.
Then came the winter, the mist, the cold. It was 1996.
In March of 1996, in the USA, TriVext Corporation, a private genetics research firm, discovered the metagene after years of studies on people who displayed unusual abilities throughout the United States.
The metagene: a tiny piece of the human DNA that, when adequately stimulated, alters the human physiology to allow extraordinary powers to manifest. Telepathy, telekinesis, extraordinary resilience. Some even said, although it's pure speculation: invisibility, flight, stretching powers.
A week after the existence of the metagene was revealed to the world, soon after the end of the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, the American Olympic Committee asked CONI, its Italian counterpart, to have a complete genetic analysis of my DNA. At first they refused, but after so much pressure from the US government, they gave them a blood sample from me.
And my winter came; the mist, the cold entered my life: I was a metahuman. My speed was a gift of the metagene. And America asked me to return my medals.
I refused. What difference was there between me and any American champion? Was their speed built only over their training? No, they were born with a better body than average people. Well, my body was better than theirs, and much better than average people.
At first, the International Olympic Committee agreed with me. But then the world's media began to promote this story. At first it was only in fitness magazines, but then it spread to most important talk shows and finally to the scientific newsletters: people with an activated metagene were not to be considered "normal" people. And having them compete with people with no activated metagene was considered unfair.
So, I was excluded from my career. My medals were returned, and I had to return most of my money. Every friend of mine turned their back to me. I had just enough money to open a restaurant. Cooking was the only hobby I had, besides running, and I turned it into a job. Today, nobody really remembers me, who I was. I'm Edulcore Cicciotto, the chef.
But when night comes, and a full moon shines in the star-dotted black night, I wear the full red vest I used in the competitions and run like hell through the poplar-lined fields of the plain.
And I'm the Eurostar again.