CHAPTER 10

"What in God's name . . .?".

Taking in the view of what they were seeing within the restricted zone, Marvellous and his group could not stop there eyes from twitching. Within the faintly lit room, a bunch of weapons that emitted a faint glow floated atop a pedestal. Low humming sounds diffused through out the room as though the weapons were alive and had spirits of their own.

"Treasures of the ancient temple ruins". Ebbie read the words translated on a piece of paper, and stuck to the body of the pedestal just beside a bunch of meaningless strokes and symbols. Which were no doubt the original.

"Look at that sword,. . . Beautiful!". Larry exclaimed and stepped forward to pick it.

But no matter how much he tugged, it wouldn't bulge. Upon coming in contact with the sword, he realised that there seemed to be a form of dominance and imposition radiating from it. The sword seemed unfathomable and unmovable as a mountain that could brave through winds and storm.

"What's wrong?".

"It . . .won't . . .bulge!". Larry grunted as he continued tugging.

"Let's help then".

Together they all gathered and began to tug with all their might. But as if planted there with several million roots, it wouldn't bulge even in the slightest.

"Wait . . .look!". Roosevelt suddenly shouted.

"Hmmm?"

"It seems you guys forgot to read the whole message". She said, "It says at this corner that the weapons choose their wielders, patience is the key . . .".

"And what does that mean actually?". Rose mumbled.

"The weapon chooses its wielder . . .". Larry said seemly gaining an insight to what it meant. "The weapons before us seem to have a certain mystery surrounding them, it seems they are alive. If I'm correct, that answers the first part, the weapons choose you based on your compatibility with them. As for the second part about the patience, you need to display a great amount of patience - most probably in the past, the weapons had chosen their wielders. But because they were impatient, they left before the weapons could acknowledge them - we have to be patient!".

"At least, that seems to be the best plan we have right now, except anyone else can come up with a better one". Marvellous said.

"No comment".

"Let's just stick to this one".

None of them had any objection to the plan, and even if they did, none of them voiced it out. They all choose to sit down instead of wasting energy, patiently bidding their time for when whatever was supposed to happen would finally take place.

"It's been six hours already". Marvellous said keeping track of time.

"When is the acceptance or whatever supposed to happened?". Mod asked impatiently, he had been sitting in the darn poorly lit room for six hours and there was nothing to show for it. "I think . . .". He was saying when the faint glowing lights emitted by the weapons suddenly began to intensify, lighting up the room.

Astonished by what they were seeing, the teens rose to their feet with dazed expressions on their faces. The already radiant weapons that seemed to have gotten rid of the wears of time - and were now releasing a golden light - slowly floated

towards them. A magnificent battle - axe floated to Roosevelt, a sword that seemed like it could slice space into two floated towards Marvellous, a whip towards Rose, a dagger towards Ebbie, a spiked recking ball flew towards Basit, a glove towards Mercy, another glove choose Timothy, and yet another Mod and Kardi J, a bow and arrow towards Kiki, a spear flew towards Josh, a mallet towards Emmanuel, a fan flew towards Ola, a cloak towards Joy, an Umbrella towards Comfort and finally an halberd flew towards Larry.

All members of the group just happened to have one for each of them, feeling their new weapons and testing them out, they were all thrilled to have such weapons. As they were testing them out, a surge of information suddenly rushed into their

brains. As more information gushed into their heads, they could feel their levels of intimacy towards their weapons increasing as if the weapons were reaching out to them.

An hour later, the teens were sitting on the ground in silence. They had thought the weapons were extra ordinary but evidently they had raised their hopes high for nothing. Frustrated, Roosevelt picked her axe and smashed it against the ground in anger, as if trying to cleave the earth into two. Then the unbelievable happened.

*RUMBLE...!*. The museum began to quake and almost instantly collapsed.

*******

Maxwell sat quietly in his home office, watching zombies occasionally drag their feet stumbly across the building sluggishly and occasionally try to break in but leaving after loosing interest. Though watching the poor creatures, he could not overcome his curiosity for the teenagers he met on the way. Suddenly, he saw a member of his raiders signalling to him with a flag waving behind him to signify the urgency. Picking his treasured cutlass, he swung the door open, directly beheaded the few zombies that were in his vicinity and ran in the direction of the raider.

"Sir, something is going with the museum". The raider said.

"What?". He asked feeling his hairs rising. The first thing that appeared on his mind at the sound of the report was zombies. He knew that for such a report, if zombies were involved, he and his few sanctuary members would not be able to survive.

"The city's museum suddenly emitted a blinging light and started quaking".

"Blinding light?, . . . Quaking?, I don't understand. When did it start?" he asked.

"A moment ago sir".

Maxwell was still thinking about the teenagers, and now this? . . . 'Just what the hell was going on?', he thought. He couldn't help but feel a bit of premonition in his heart as he entered a truck and started the engine, he had a feeling he was in for a crazy surprise.

Standing before the museum, Maxwell watched with twitching eyes as the quaking increased in intensity. The building finally reached its limit and collapsed with a rumble, covering the area with dust. Slowly the dust died down to reveal a kind of barrier covering a small area of the desolation. As the dust died down completely, the light barrier began to grow faint until it began to flicker and finally collapsed with a faint popping sound, revealing a set of figures within. Maxwell could not help but suck in cold breath as he gazed at the silhouettes, no matter how he looked at them, they seemed incomparably familiar. As the silhouettes began to move, walking towards him and his raiders, his conviction solidified increasingly until finally he could see their faces. THEY WERE THE TEENS!.

Watching them step out of the rumbles with each steps they took giving off the impressions that they were legends, Maxwell's heart seemed to bleed. His two encounters with the teenagers hadn't been under any nice circumstances so he

couldn't strike a favourable conversation with them and also, he couldn't fight them over the museum.

"Hmhm . . . I guess it's nothing to concern ourselves with". He said. "Seeing that they are the cause, even if we are to question them, we are not the owners of the city. Besides, they are just too mysterious."

"Yes sir".

"Hey . . . Over here!".

As Maxwell turned to and began to walk to his truck, a voice suddenly called. With uncertainty, he turned back to make sure he was the one the voice was calling out for.

"We meet again!".

This was the confirmation Maxwell needed. Casting a quick glance at Anthonia, he saw an equal expression of surprise on her face.

'I bet she is just as shocked as I am at this moment, looks likes she finally got the shock of her life'. Maxwell silently

laughed at the expression on Anthonia's face.

The teenagers were still afar off, walking casually towards him and Maxwell could not help but wonder how they were able to recognise him so easily.

'Well if I can recognise them, why shouldn't they be able to do the same?'. He thought.

Minutes later . . ..

Standing before him, the teenagers eyed him and his raiders while he in turn did the same. Then the mysterious one suddenly spoke . . . "We meet again!".