Look Closer

150 Years Ago

"150 years ago, before our present community was established, there was complete chaos. The Prevalent ages were disastrous. The Prevalents, humans without powers, started a huge multi-continental war. This war was called World War III. Prevalents had created a special kind of weapon called a nuclear weapon.

"Nuclear weapons were weapons that could wreak all kinds of havoc wherever they were used. When a nuclear bomb was dropped, it would wipe out whole cities, and could do great damage to a nation.

"These nuclear weapons were created because of a country having an oversupply of nuclear waste. Every country had nuclear weapons, and they were said to be 'defensive weapons that would only be fired when necessary.'

"Soon enough, conflicts began to grow between countries, and arguments were starting to break out between people who were loyal to either one country or another. People would be sitting in bars throwing drinks at each other while watching people run around on little screens they called TVs, a less advanced version of a WallScreen, and people started dying. The two countries that fought the most were America and North Korea. North Korea and its neighboring countries are now part of the Abandoned Territories, but some parts of America survived. 

"These two countries had been unfriendly towards each other for centuries, but now the feuds between the two countries had escalated to an entirely new level, one that had never been reached before. North Korea went to such levels as to drop a nuclear bomb onto America without reason or warning, causing the worst conflict of the century.

"Many parts of America and Canada, its neighboring country, were destroyed during the conflict. Canada didn't want to be any part of the War, but it started losing people from the damage caused by it. America sent a peace treaty to Canada that, when signed, would mean that they were united as one country: Canerica. Canada signed the peace treaty and sent weapons to America so that they could fight the Asian Alliance. 

"The Asian Alliance was a group of five different powerful Asian countries: China, North Korea, Japan, India, and Singapore. Singapore was a small island, but it had many people willing to fight. They were the head and the brains of the alliance. 

"People all over the world were in a state of panic, and the rate of suicide, the act of someone killing themselves, skyrocketed. By the time the War was being fought in full force, 75% of the world population had either died in the attacks or killed themselves. Many civilians were injured just because of where they were living, and most of those who survived fled to either Europe, South America, or Africa, three continents who were not at all a part of this War. 

"It took years and years, but with the force of Canerica's armies and support from a few other countries in Asia who didn't believe in the Asian Alliance, Canerica won the War. By then most countries had been demolished from the nuclear waste that was created during the battle, and only 5% of the world population, which was once booming and on a steady upward rise, remained. 

"Only some of the 5% were able to survive and live in the nuclear waste, and those people reported having powers that were not possible for humans to have. Their powers were only in developmental stages then, not at all quite the range that we have here. Some people could see in the dark, like our first President of Canerica, John Williams the Third, and some people could float a few feet off of the ground. Only one person remained who did not evolve to have special powers, and that was our second President of Canerica, Mandy Williams, the daughter of John Williams. 

"Mandy was placed into the seat of President, because it was decided that those who had stayed alive and not evolved were the most evolved of them all. They didn't need to depend on powers to survive, and they are still the ones who are put into positions of power. We only have a few on record, and there are still those who are undiscovered. Micah Johnson, our twentieth President of Canerica, is one of those."

Coughing and spluttering, I arose from my slumber, lifting my head off of the boring History textbook that I was supposed to be reading. I glanced back down to see that the pink feathers from my pen had made their way into my mouth, and they were the reason why I was disturbed during my wonderful mid-class nap. I could still taste them on my mouth and stuck my tongue out to see that there were still some in my mouth that needed to be extracted. I pulled them out and started coughing, my breaths coming in big gulps.

I laid my head back down on to the book, sighed, and closed my eyes. I knew that my assignment was to read all of Chapter 1, and I had only made it through a quarter of it, but I couldn't bring myself to stare down at the jet black blocky computer typed words and try to retain some of the information.

As my teacher came around, I had to pretend to become alert and attentive though. You could hear her from a mile away; her breathing was so loud that it made a snoring tiger seem quiet. My head swam as I moved it back up and tried to keep reading, so I decided to just stare at it until I remembered something.

I turned my attention back to the boring beginnings of Canerica, and pressed my nose into the book, but not before taking one last look at the bland torture chamber encompassing me to make sure I wasn't being watched. Even though I was working now, I couldn't have people knowing that I wasn't actually reading before; everyone's a tattletale.

"Gabrielle," a voice whispered from behind me, "Gabby!" it said.

Wondering if I was actually still dreaming, I pinched myself, hard, but felt every bit of it. There is no way that she could be here, she left for early graduation months ago!

But there was no mistaking that Southern voice. "Ava?" I whispered, turning my head and dropping my jaw in utter shock and bewilderment.