So, who wants a dash of harsh reality?

The world isn't full of flowers and pixie dust. There is no Superman, no man in a fancy hat to steal from the rich and give to the poor, and no man flying around in an iron suit blasting Chitauri out of the sky. Sorry, kids. That's just life.

Although, while there aren't superheroes, there are still those who try to make things a little better. Like police, firemen, and paramedics. However, a lot of people have misconceptions on the matter. They think these emergency forces do the minimum work it takes to get a paycheck, that they don't really care about the people they're supposed to be helping. While this may be true in some cases, there are plenty that really do care. It's just the slackers who give everyone else a bad name.

I'm Detective Thomas "Skipper" McGrath. I got the nickname "Skipper" because I'm often referred to as a natural-born leader, and I'm the skipper of my unit. Whenever there's a crisis, I often take charge without realizing it, and no one seems to object. I typically know just the right thing to do.

I've been a detective for many years. Before that, a police officer. I've seen a lot in that time: death, suicide, hostage crisis, bank robberies, assault and battery, you name it. I would never admit this to anyone, but a lot of it stays on my mind for a while. I hate that any of it happens. I'd give anything to go back in time and prevent it from happening, even take their places. But I can't. That's why I do what I can to make things better, to bring justice to wrongdoers. It makes things a little easier to deal with.

My partner and second in command, Doctor Kowalski Bennett, is the department's medical examiner. He specializes in autopsies, chemicals and other foreign agents, and other science-y stuff that I can't pronounce. He's highly intelligent in pretty much anything except love (don't even get me started on Doris). We've cracked a lot of cases together.

Kowalski and I met in grade school. He was the new guy, and as the new guy, everyone was sizing him up — or should I say, sizing him down. While he's tall and physically fit today, he was rather small and skinny in those times. That, on top of being a "nerd," didn't exactly win him a seat with the popular kids at lunch. I noticed that people were bullying him, but he always shrugged it off and never acted like it bothered him, so I never thought anything about it.

One day, as I was leaving the building after school had ended, I saw these four boys ganging up on him outside, on the side of the building where it'd be hard for anyone to notice them. They were knocking his books to the ground, snatching his glasses off his face and stomping on them, and pushing him to each other like some kind of tetherball. I wasn't sure what to do, but I knew they were making me angry just beating him up for no good reason. So, I walked over and the boys asked me what I wanted. I told them they should go on home before Principal Bratt caught them. They just laughed and told me to mind my own business.

So, I asked them why they were picking on someone because they're jealous of how smart he is.

Probably seems like a lame comeback now, but it was pretty effective then. As you probably guessed, they didn't like that. In a split second, they'd completely forgotten about Kowalski and started advancing toward me, and I threw my bag to the ground as I set my center of gravity. They surrounded me and laughed, like they thought my combative stance was only a bluff. Finally, one took a swing at me and the others followed. While I managed to fight back, I was still outnumbered. Unlike now, I was only a green-belt in karate at that age. After a couple minutes of fighting, a sharp, "Stop!" caught our attention and we looked back to match a face to the voice.

It was Kowalski, and he threw something at one of the boys holding me back, and I didn't realize what it was until a piece of it landed on me. It looked like the project on mold that was due tomorrow in our biology class. The boys freaked out, giving me a moment's opportunity to clip one in the jaw, kick another in the stomach, and throw one into the other into the wall. While they were temporarily fazed, I grabbed Kowalski's arm and my bag, helped him pick up his books, and we hightailed it, the boys calling curse words at our backs.

After running for about four blocks, we decided it was safe enough to assume we weren't being followed. We walked in silence for a while as we caught our breath. Then we started talking about what happened.

"Why did you help me back there?" he'd asked me, not meeting my eye.

"Well," I'd started, not really sure what to say, "I didn't think it was right for them to treat you like that."

"Aren't you one of the popular kids? Why would you care about what happens to me?" he'd asked, awkwardly hugging his tattered books to his chest.

I shrugged, searching the ground for a response. "I just . . . I mean, sure I'm popular, and I get along with everyone, but I don't have any real friends. To be honest, I really don't — fit in at all. It's just an act so people don't think I'm weird," I admitted. I'd never told anyone that before. How could I, unless I wanted the whole school to think I was an outcast? "And I hate bullies," I added, trying to deter the subject.

Kowalski slowed his pace and I turned to him, looking at anything but his face. "Really?" he'd asked. I just nodded and raked my fingers through my black hair. "Well . . . thanks. No one's ever stuck up for me like that. I try to act like it doesn't bother me being bullied, but . . ." His voice trailed off and he fiddled with a loose paper that was sticking out of his book.

I passively shrugged a shoulder. "No problem. And, uh, thanks for sacrificing your project to help me out. I probably would've been a dead man if you hadn't."

Kowalski smiled. "I wish I could've done something more. I just thought a smelly distraction might give you an opportunity. I guess I was right."

"According to your test scores, I'd say you're right a lot," I joked. We laughed awkwardly and Kowalski tried to straighten his papers. I caught a glimpse of a Commodore Danger folder in his backpack and smiled.

"Hey, you're into Commodore Danger?"

Kowalski's face flushed a little bit. "Yeah, it's my favorite movie," he answered, quickly zipping his backpack up.

"Really? Mine, too! I loved the movie where his ship got overthrown by the enemy," I said, causing Kowalski to perk up. We finished together, "You can take my ship, but you can't take the fight from my soul!"

And so, a lifelong friendship was born. More than a friendship, now, more of a kinship. We're like brothers — we would give our lives for each other.

Rico DiMag is an entirely different story.

Kowalski and I met Rico in our Freshman year of high school. He was the new kid from a county over. To be honest, Kowalski and I started off by avoiding him because he had an intimidating look about him. Then he and Kowalski got paired together as lab partners in chemistry and we realized we'd gotten the wrong impression of him. While he may have a short temper, he's actually a pretty nice guy, and doesn't hurt anyone without probable cause. Even then, it was never anything that would do permanent damage.

He doesn't talk much, and when he does, it's through a low grumble that's usually hard for people to understand. Because Kowalski and I have known him for so long, we've gotten used to it, and most of the time, we can understand without too much difficulty. Call it a language only we can understand. Rico told us that it was a result of an accident when he was eleven. His mom was driving him home from school and someone ran a red light. Unfortunately, the impact was on his mom's side, and . . . she didn't make it. Rico made it out with a broken leg, a dislocated shoulder, a concussion, a scar on his left lip, and he'd breathed in some debris that'd lodged in his vocal cords. With surgery, they successfully were able to remove it all, but his voice was irreversibly damaged.

We even got Rico into Commodore Danger. Kowalski and I had no objection to watching the entire movie series over again with him. Later on the same year, he became captain of the football team and we didn't get to see each other that often besides classes, but that never pulled us apart. Kowalski and I went to every game to support Rico. As much as Rico and I weren't into Kowalski's academic competitions, we attended every one of them to cheer him on.

This was also the year our school started to talk to us about what we wanted to do when we grew up. Admittedly, this was something we hadn't put much thought into. But when our school held a College/Career Fair, it changed everything. At first, we wandered aimlessly around the gym just to act like we were doing something, and then one of the tables outlining the room caught our attention. It was a table covered with a blue banner that read, "New York State Police Academy."

As odd as it sounds, the table had some kind of a magnetic pull on us, as if we were destined to be a part of it. There was a male and female representative in uniform who told us about the Academy and the kinds of ideals it teaches. This really caught our attention. We all went to my house that afternoon and we started discussing it, and even looked up some information on the Academy and the requirements to become a police officer. The more we looked into it, the more appealing it became to us. We joined JROTC together the following year, and by the time we graduated, we had narrowed our goals a little further down from just being police officers.

Of course, Kowalski found his interest in forensic science. He could examine deceased bodies for clues, examine foreign agents in a crime scene, and figure out the cause of death. To be perfectly honest, I think the job is perfect for him. His two loves combined into one: dishing out justice and mind games.

Rico stayed with the police officer idea for the longest. After a couple years of official police work, he had narrowed his interests to weapons expert. I'd bet the guy could disarm any bomb with a blindfold and one hand tied behind his back. He also can identify exactly what type of weapon was used even just by the shape of the dent it left behind. He's identified fired bullets just by the way they feel. He can even identify non-traditional murder weapons. If you whacked your father to inherit his estate by stabbing a salad fork into his head, Rico could have that figured out in less than five minutes.

Me, well, I started my first few years after high school in the military which led to some long stories that aren't relevant right now, and then I spent some time doing police work with a couple of soldiers that left the military with me, Manfredi and Johnson. Eventually I decided to change career paths. Police officers are honorable and are great in what they do, but detectives, that's what appealed to me. Diving deep into the roots of a crime, finding clues, interrogating the suspects, chasing down perpetrators, testifying in court to bring justice to wrongdoers. So, naturally, my team and I worked our way up to the FBI. I love what I do.

I met Marlene Sullivan when I became a detective. She had a few years of experience already as a detective. She pulled some strings and got us all on the same unit in our precinct. We've all been working together for a while now.

Kowalski, Rico, Manfredi, Johnson, Marlene, and I have solved a lot of cases together.

So, I guess you could say I've come a long way from that scuffle on the side of the school. I don't know what I'd do without any of them. We're living proof that family doesn't always mean blood.

The chosen family we've made is much closer.