Everyone and everything we know and love. Thanks to a virus. We all carry mutations. Genetic mutations can give you laser vision. Or cancer. Or color blindness. Sometimes a mutation is on a DNA strand that doesn’t do anything at all. And sometimes – almost never – a genetic mutation will cause an entire species to make an evolutionary leap forward. Think about it... a virus with powers. Sounds like something a biologist would want to protect.

Sin is rarely without complication.

I’m a good person. I eat pretty well. I work out. I go to bookstores. I save people. For a living. I have better things to do than get hauled in for a medical checkup every week. Have I complained the last few months? Constantly. Was I a good patient? No. What can I say? When your primary care provider is a shadowy government agency, you have to be your own medical advocate.

I finally realized that I was being unrealistic. I could never be like my heroes. They all had something I didn’t. A Y-chromosome.

She was a beautiful girl, but the lack of any spark dampened her prettiness.

How did I get here? I’m not rich. Not a mutant. Not a genius. Not a natural. I just try harder. I always have.

Gah! It’s never going to be safe. There will always be another monster. How am I supposed to grow up to be a bad ass... if you don’t let me be brave?

Schools, by definition, come with a couple hundred potential hostages and you didn’t want kids shot because you rushed it. Of course the drills presumed that the mad gunman was another kid. Kids are unpredictable. Kids with guns are extremely unpredictable. And no one wanted to have to shoot a kid, even one with a gun. So, secure, assess, wait.

The Bermuda Triangle coughs up myths like a consumptive asthmatic. Missing vessels are blamed on aliens. Atlantis. Time rifts. Ghost ships. Magnetic anomalies. Methane eruptions. People go mad. People lose their minds. Sometimes I think I’ve been in the Bermuda Triangle my whole life.

What’s your name, honey?” Frank asked her. “Beth Riley,” she said. She could hear footsteps overhead as the agents stomped around her parents’ bedroom upstairs. “What’s your real name?” he asked. Her skin prickled. “Beth Riley,” she said again.