“Each forward step we take we leave some phantom of ourselves behind.”
― John Lancaster Spalding

The price for the Myopic Three
and Eight is the quick degeneration
of their eyesight. Continually shifting

focus and eyeglass lenses causes the member's sight to be permanently blurred
within a decade (years sooner for most).

A permanent settlement was built
in a converted trailer park in the Florida panhandle
for the collective's nearly blind.

Each Lens is used to monitor (and attack, move, coax)
a different entity. Some lenses, they suggest,

can be used to foretell future
events (within 32 seconds), their seemingly bizarre
actions to save others from speeding

vehicles or falling heavies,
are met with confused and fearful awe.

They believed some objects, some creatures,
some landscape wonders
could never be seen without the proper
focus, the most accurate
and specific fusion of light
and the light's refraction into the eye.

They is/are more than a word described
and defined as groups of other,

over there collections. They are
the Myopic Three and Eight,
a hovering collective taught and teaching
how what we "see" in the world,

can be altered and enhanced
by curved/convexed glass, millimeters
from our/their eyes.

However, the mineral had an extremely
high gravity, which made even small amounts
difficult to extract. Additionally,

the mineral's alarmingly high gravity
meant it was difficult
to separate into smaller samples.

For seventeen years a mineral
was mined in central Australia. The rare mineral, unique to the region,
, was highly conductive and could store

energy/electricity at exponentially
, higher rates than other substances.

A machine was developed
to mine the substance,

its mechanisms dissecting and removing
relatively tiny portions.

And for nearly a decade
the crane/dozer-like vehicles<
were successfully used to extract the mineral.

The mining operations ceased

after research revealed any devices
with batteries using the mineral
were immediately and destructively

attracted to each other. 
During the research tests,
twelve cases of amputation
and one death were recorded.