It was a beautiful day, brilliantly blue and cloudless and the sun baked the San Diego streets as Caitlin Rose Baker walked to school, surrounded by her friends who were busy catching up on the latest television episodes. It really was the perfect day for an 18th birthday and Caitlin was enjoying every minute of it. She bounded into class, waving hello to her friend Jiāo as she sat down. He had been one of the people she became fast friends with at Aquinas Academy and she loved hanging out with him outside of school. Caitlin’s phone buzzed with a text message and she silenced it quickly without much thought. It looked like another birthday text message from her East Coast friends. What was a Rikti anyway? She snapped her phone shut as the late bell rang and the teacher started collecting last night’s Calculus homework. As Caitlin passed her papers forward, the classroom darkened with a greenish cast. The students turned to the windows and saw waves of flames erupting below dark clouds and flat circles gathering slowly in the sky; her teacher was shouting something but her words were lost in the din outside the windows. Finally, Caitlin was able to make out a few words- "Rikti attack" and "Get outside" were among them. The classroom shook with the force of the attacks outside. The tinny voice over the intercom repeated the warning, "This is not a drill. Please evacuate the building in an orderly fashion." and alarms clanged shrilly across the school. Debris rained down from the ceiling and Caitlin managed to look around the classroom once at the scared faces of her classmates before the roof caved in on top of them, shrouding them in darkness.

She had no idea what time it was when she opened her eyes but Caitlin heard people shouting above her. Above her? Where was she? What had happened? Light shone through the rubble as someone lifted a huge boulder off of her. A gloved hand reached down and scooped her out of the concrete; she looked up to see a masked face- the Heroes had come to rescue them. Miraculously, Caitlin had escaped major harm since the rubble had created a pocket when it had fallen but some of her classmates hadn't been so lucky. Her eyes darted around the classroom, trying to absorb the chaos- bodies of students, her friends, were being pulled from the wreckage, capes were flying around the classroom, shell shocked students stared vacantly at each other. She saw Jiāo running outside towards the wreckage and her friend Andrew being pulled from the rubble. His face was the color of paste except for the ragged, crimson gash stretching from brow to cheek and he hung limply from the cloaked arms of another Hero.

"Caitlin?"

She ripped her eyes from her friend and saw her parents climbing over the rubble towards her. The Hero who had pulled her out set her down- had he really been holding her this whole time?- and went over to her parents. Bits of conversation drifted towards her but it sounded muffled and broken. Again, she heard the words "Rikti" and "Attack". She had just heard about these attacks from her friends but they had seemed so far away on the East Coast and of little importance then. Could that have only been minutes ago? Maybe she should have paid more attention. Her parents walked over to her, helped her get to her feet and silently left what remained of the classroom, of the school, in the hands of the Heroes.