My mother’s cart sounds especially loud in this silence. I wish I had time to argue with her. A sense of urgency builds in me as if responding to the buildup before lightning. We just need to make it to Page Mill.

I push faster, zigzagging from car to car. Behind me, Mom’s breathing gets heavier and more labored. Paige is so silent, I half suspect she’s holding her breath.

Something white floats gently down and lands on Paige. She picks it up and turns to show me. All the blood drains from her face and her eyes are enormous.

It’s a fluffy piece of down. A snowy feather. The kind that might work its way out of a goose down comforter, only a little larger.

The blood drains out of my face too.

What are the chances?

They mostly target the major cities. Silicon Valley is just a plain strip of low-storied offices and suburbs between San Francisco and San Jose. San Francisco’s already been hit, so if they were going to attack anything in this area, it’d be San Jose, not the valley. It’s just some bird flying by, that’s all. That’s all.

But I’m already panting with panic.

I force myself to look up. All I see is endless dark sky.

But then, I do see something. Another, larger feather floats down lazily toward my head.

Sweat prickles my brow. I break out into an all-out sprint.

Mom’s cart rattles crazily behind me as she desperately follows. She doesn’t need explanations or encouragement to run. I’m scared one of us will fall, or Paige’s chair will tip, but I can’t stop. We have to find a place to hide. Now, now, now.

The hybrid car I was aiming for suddenly crumples under the weight of something crashing down on it. The thunder of the crash almost makes me jump out of my boots. Luckily, it covers Mom’s scream.

I catch a flash of tawny limbs and snowy wings.

An angel.

I have to blink to make sure it’s real.

I’ve never seen an angel before, not live anyway. Of course, we’ve all seen the looping footage of golden-winged Gabriel, Messenger of God, being gunned down from the pile of rubble that was Jerusalem. But watching TV, you could always tell yourself it wasn’t real, even if it was on every news program for days.

But there’s no denying that this is the real deal. Men with wings. Angels of the Apocalypse. Supernatural beings who’ve pulverized the modern world and killed millions, maybe even billions of people.

And here’s one of the horrors, right in front of me.

CHAPTER 3

I almost tip Paige in my rush to spin around and change direction. We skid to a halt behind a parked moving van. I peek out from behind it, unable to stop watching.

Five more angels swoop down on the one with the snowy wings. Judging by their aggressive stance, it’s a fight of five against one. It’s too dark to see any details on the landing angels but there’s something about the shape of the wings of one of them that strikes me as different. Their wings fold too fast when they land for me to take a good look and I’m left wondering if there actually was anything different about that one. He’s a giant, towering over the rest.