“
          outside the boundaries of its own skin—these things had driven the species to the edge of destruction. Worse, this one organism threatened the survival of all life on Earth. The Silencer’s makers did not have to look far for a solution. The answer lay in another species that had conquered the entirety of its domain, ruling it with unquestioned authority for millions of years. Beyond their immaculate design, the reason sharks rule the ocean is their complete indifference to everything except feeding, procreation, and defending their territory. The shark does not love. It feels no empathy. It trusts nothing. It lives in perfect harmony with its environment because it has no aspirations or desires. And no pity. A shark feels no sorrow, no remorse, hopes for nothing, dreams of nothing, has no illusions about itself or anything beyond itself. Once a human named Evan Walker had a dream—a dream it can no longer remember—and in that dream there was a tent in the woods and in that tent there was a girl who called herself humanity, and the girl was worth more to it than its own life. No longer. When it finds her,
          ”
          ”