bound | reus

2.

"It's ridiculous," Marco spoke. "You should see the way she treats me. Like we never knew each other at all."

"I don't think you knew this Romessa," stated Julian. "I don't think any of us did."

Marco watched as Romessa turned and made her way towards where the players sat, her sleek computer tucked under her arm. She ran a hand through her shiny hair, allowing Marco to catch a whiff of her fruity shampoo, before speaking. "Are you done eating? We have more tests to run."

We. "I haven't even taken three bites of my sandwich," Marco retorted. "It's been five minutes since I sat down."

Julian was gawking now, watching as Romessa huffed and sat a few feet away from Marco, pulling out her own lunch—a wrap and a latte, also from the kitchens. "You've really injured yourself," she spoke, opening her computer. "How did it happen?"

Marco was almost mortified by her willingness to speak to him, particularly after expressing his dissatisfaction to Julian. "I hurt it at a friendly," I responded, watching in relief as Julian was called away by a nearby coach. With him gone, maybe she'll talk to me. "What are you doing here, in Germany?"

"Isn't it obvious?" She motioned to her computer. "I'm using you to test Athleta. It's what we've been doing for the past three days." She spoke with sass, leaving Marco to twist his lips.

"Tell me about it, then."

Romessa paused just as she was about to take a bite of her wrap. "Tell you about what?"

"The program," Marco breathed.

Romessa's dark eyes met his. He felt himself cower slightly under her gaze, which penetrated his with much more power than it ever had before. "It's a series of patented algorithms. They store information as you exercise, then analyze that information to develop specialized routines for recovery. The idea isn't mine, but the code is. It's the most efficient code, and it creates the best variety of solutions. These first few days of testing are rudimentary. We're having you do a series of training exercises to understand your limits, what your body can and can't handle given your injury. It'll take time for the code to analyze that information, but when it does, it'll come up with several options for your recovery process. Then—"

"Options. What do you mean by that?" Curious, Marco watched as Romessa moved slightly closer to him. He knew it wasn't intentional. He remembered the nights they'd spend at his place, listening to her tell him that she wanted to use technology to change the world someday. She was so bright, and she got so eager when she described her intricate ideas—just as she'd done just now, her excitement would always cause her body to inadvertently gravitate towards his.

"If a player sprained his ankle, we would run the physical tests on his body using Athleta. The program would also take the information from his physical examinations before he was injured—in other words, when he was in good form—by accessing the database in which this information is stored. The code compares and analyzes this information in order to say 'if this player does x exercise x amount of times and follows this diet, then they can recover—meaning they can match their stats to the ones recorded from when they were in healthy form—by x date'. So, you have the option to tell the program that you want to recover in, say, two months. If the program determines that it's possible to do so given your injury and your physical performance trends, it'll tell you which exercises and other guidelines you need to follow. The routines vary in difficulty, of course."