“Joseph Baker, age 16, Caucasian male, arrested for arson, attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, possession of an illegal weapon, breaking and entering, trespassing, resisting arrest, and truancy from school.” The desk sergeant read the folder to me as I stared across the interrogation table. The kid didn’t look 12, let alone 16.

“What is this contraption, kid?” I asked him, holding his hardware up. He stopped staring at his feet and stared up at me with a rage that I had never seen in adults. Not in thirty years on the force had I ever seen someone look so angry. Maybe defiance, I thought.

“It’s my purifier.” He said, in a monotone.

“Purifier. Right.” I said. “Of course it is. It’s a set of fire resistant mittens, rigged with a crude ignition device, with two rubber hoses running up your sleeves into a pressurized hydration bladder which you’ve filled with…some sort of jellied gasoline.”

“It’s my purifier. It cleanses the unholy.”

“Kids these days..” I stood up to leave. “Book him.”