I hesitate to tell them about the experiments on the kids. Will they put two and two together and suspect that these kids might be the low demons who were tearing people apart on the roads? Will they suspect that Paige might be one of them? I’m not sure what to do, but I end up telling them in vague terms that kids have been operated on.

“So your sister, is she all right?” asks Obi.

“Yes, I’m sure she’ll be back to herself soon.” I say this without hesitation. Of course she’s all right. What else can she be? What choice do we have? I try to radiate confidence through my voice despite the worry that gnaws at me.

“Tell us more about these scorpion angels,” says our other passenger. He has wavy hair, glasses, and rich brown skin. He has the air of a scholar who’s getting his geek on over a favorite topic.

In my relief to change the subject from Paige, I tell them every detail I can recall. Their size, their dragonfly wings, their total lack of uniformity that’s so unlike lab specimens you see in the movies. How some of them seemed embryonic but others looked nearly fully formed. I tell him about the people trapped in the tanks with them, getting their lives sucked out of them.

When I finish, there’s a pause as everyone absorbs my tale.

Just as I think this question-and-answer session will be easy, they ask about the demon who carried me and dropped me off at the Resistance rescue truck during the aerie attack. I have no idea what to say so my answer to all their questions is, “I don’t know. I was unconscious.”

Despite that, I’m surprised at how many questions they ask about “the demon.”

Was he the devil? Did he say anything about what he was doing there? Where did you meet him? Do you know where he went? Why did he drop you off with us?

“I don’t know,” I say for the umpteenth time. “I was unconscious.”

“Can you reach him again?”

That last question squeezes my heart a little. “No.”

Dee-Dum does a quick U-turn to avoid a backed-up side road.

“Anything else you’d like to tell us?” asks Obi.

“No.”

“Thank you,” says Obi. He turns to look at the other passenger. “Sanjay, your turn. I hear you have a theory about the angels that you want to share with us?”

“Yes,” says the scholar holding up a map of the world. “I think that most of the killing during the Great Attack could have been incidental. Sort of a side effect of the angels coming here. My hypothesis is that when a couple of them enter our world, it’s a local phenomenon.”