Elder Apeiros

"But it hurts, my eyes hurt. Why do my eyes hurt?"

"Your eyes are adjusting for the first time in your life. Just leave it. Once your eyes finish adjusting they won't hurt. It'll take some time but don't worry."

"Where are you?"

"Right in front of you, right here." I see a blur move in front of me. From what I can see, he reaches out his hand, I grab it and he pulls me up.

"If only my friends and my family could see me now."

"Here you need to come with me and meet the elders."

He leads me to the edge of town which is where he keeps an old military jeep. "Here Nick, you sit in the front with me and we'll drive to the see the elders." We drive past roads, bent signposts, desert countryside, an overpopulation of kangaroos and dry creeks. "We're driving just straight across the terrain and roads because the distance we're going it would take a few hours, but because of the war no one cares because no one lives here."

I look up at him, I see a blur still but my eyes are slowly focusing. "So where are you taking me?"

"There's this tower in the middle of nowhere called Zenith." It's a tall cylinder building with a demolished top and small guard towers around it with walls joining the guard towers. "This is where the elder living. They'll tell you everything you need to know." Bert mentions. We walk up behind someone.

"Nick, this is Jim. He's, what we call a jumper. Jim was born without the ability to move his legs so when he came to us he was not only able to move his legs but he can also move between places in the blink of an eye..." Bert laughs, "we still don't know if he is able to teleport or if he is able to move so fast we just see a flash. But we'll find out one day."

"I keep telling you, I teleport." He says. "Anyway, G'day Nick."

"Jim, could you take us up to see the elders?"

"Sure, Bert. Hold on you two. I like a bit of effect." He grabs our hands and throws down a ball and smoke bursts everywhere.

I walk a few meters and look down the middle of the large tower over a glass balustrading. "We're pretty far up guys. Why are we so high up?"

"Nick? You might wanna see this." I turn to see a skeleton sitting on a chair pointing to me.

Bert sees a note pinned to the chair. He picks it off. "It says, For those of you who find this note on my chair, I am Elder Apeiros..." There's a sword through its ribs. "...I was killed by the other Elders which whom I tried to protect. To whom I point will protect the weak now that I am gone..."

"What!?" I scream.

"Wait, there's more. It reads, For those of you who find this note on my chair, I am Elder Apeiros. I was killed by the other Elders which whom I tried to protect. To whom I point will protect the weak now. To whom I point, take this ring on my finger and be known for you're title protector of the weak." Jim reads.

"Wait, what. I see no such ring and it's pointing to me. Is there any more to the note?"

"So, now the Elders are dead, what now?"

"We go to my home." Bert replies. He turns to Jim and raises one eyebrow.

"I know what you're going to ask and I'm way ahead of ya. Hold on." Jim says to us both as we leave him standing there. We walk out to the jeep and get in. Bert starts the engine and turns around towards Marblegold.

"When we met, you told me that I would have other abilities. What did you mean by that?"

"I meant, just like Jim is now able to walk he can also do more, he can jump between places. See, whatever someone has lost or never had, the radiation will fill it in but will also add to it. So depending on what your disability was you will have something else to add to your new ability. So for example when I got my sight I also got the ability to, at will, zoom my sight more than 2 kilometers. I am also able to view infrared heat, but that didn't come for another few days. I believe you'll have a similar experience within next few days."

"Tell me more about your village."

"Well," He starts. "we call Village area marblegold because of the golden landscaping the marble we found in the rocks nearby. I don't know of any other village like mine in this country but I imagine there are a few."

"Any other like yours? Why is it so unique?"

"Well, apart from being a village in the twenty-second century we are about finding those, like yourself, who have come up from below and helping them to find their own power. We take care of them, help the hurting and protect the weak."

"Protect them from what?"

"From themselves really."

"What does that mean?"

"Well, some of us know and the rest will find out the hard way that the radiation here not only gives us new abilities and, for some of us, it saves our lives, it also will become too much."

"What do you mean?"

"It has happened before and I believe it'll happen again. For those who haven't already lost their minds, due to the fact that over time the radiation will become more and more concentrated their minds will go soon. I believe this is why the other elders killed Apeiros. I have seen it before. The time will come, for some sooner then we might think."

"Will the radiation ever go away?"

"I believe it will go away in about two hundred years."

"Well, is there anything we can do for them to prevent them going insane?"

"Well the only places in the world where there's no radiation is at the tops of mountains, but we can't pick up and move the village to the top of mount Zeil, which I might add is on the over the side of Alice Springs. As far as we are away from Alice the mountain is about the same distance from Alice in the other opposite direction."

"True, true, but how do we save them?"

"I don't know, we'll think of something."

We arrive at this community hall like building and we walk inside.

"Here Nick you'll sleep here tonight until we get you a home built." I lay my head down and rest and after a while, everything fades...