Content Warning: This story references substance use and addiction, discussions of suicide, and bullying.

“The Era” takes place in a society where people have developed the technology to manipulate their children’s genes and strengthen key attributes before they are born. Because the process is imperfect, it is optional. Optimal people look down on those who are born with physical distortions or heightened emotions. This also resonates with the widespread belief that emotion clouds truth. As a result, people speak freely to one another, regardless of whether those statements might be taken as offensive.

The story begins when Mr. Harper, a HowItWas teacher, explains the cultural underpinnings that resulted in the Water Wars and how their current wars are better because they’re honest and unemotional. After class, Ben, who narrates the story and wasn’t optimized before birth, goes to the nurse’s office to receive an additional dose of a mood-enhancing drug called “Good”—he already received a first dose that morning. On the way, he encounters his sister, Marlene, who asks why he isn’t going to eat yet. Marlene is optimized, but rather than receiving an even spread of personality traits, all of her personality points went into the ambition category.