Where were you the day Disney World was bombed? This is the question that will haunt my generation for the rest of our lives. The twenty-fourth of August. An awful ghoul now, still so fresh in our memories, fading into a hazier shadow that will walk beside us until the very end. Our skin will prickle as we drive by a summer carnival or see pictures of an old castle and its arching, majestic towers; when we tuck our own children into bed someday, and they ask us to read them a story filled with princes and princesses. Because our fairy tale ended that day. Our castles were covered in blood. This type of question is not new, of course. Each generation has its own markers, its own moments that were so devastating, so beyond comprehension, that the world stopped spinning when they first heard the news. Where were you when JFK was shot? When the planes crashed into the Twin Towers? We come together in the wake of these epic tragedies. We hope for change; we promise ourselves and each other that this won't happen again, can't possibly happen again. That this time, our world will be different. Then it does happen, somehow worse than the last time, despite our intentions. Our world--it is not so different after all. Humanity is predictable in its restlessness and its frustration, its ability to cause destruction, and its ability to so soon forget. But we cannot forget this. If there is a next time--if there is a grander, more terrifying next time--the world will end. It must. Because how could there be worse? How could there possibly be anything worse, without our whole broken, beautiful world going up in flames? Excerpted from Transcendent by Katelyn Detweiler All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.