The Shadows

THE SHALLOWS

Chapter 1

The intersection of Woodward and Congress in downtown Detroit was a chaotic gauntlet of late-afternoon noise. It was 5:15 PM, and the rush-hour gridlock was at its peak. Heavy diesel buses belched gray exhaust into the damp air, and a wall of car horns blended into a single, droning vibration that rattled the glass of the towering brick buildings. On the concrete sidewalks, thousands of people moved in tight lockstep, wrapped in their own tiny worlds, completely blind to the rest of the world.

Then, the world broke.

There was no warning. Suddenly, the sky didn't just get dark-the light was completely swallowed up. It was an aggressive, suffocating blackness that dropped over the city like a heavy velvet shroud. The streetlamps flickered once and died. The headlights of idling cars vanished, leaving nothing but an impossible, absolute dark.

Panic didn't hit the crowd instantly; a profound, terrifying silence did. In that complete darkness, the laws of the earth stripped away. From somewhere high above the skyscrapers, two massive, towering shadows tore straight down out of the pitch-black sky. They hit the wet asphalt of Woodward Avenue with the force of an earthquake, cracking the concrete.

They weren't human. All you could see were the terrifying, shifting shapes of the Shadows. One silhouette expanded, throwing out the massive, jagged outline of wings made of pure, consuming darkness. The other shadow stood rigid against it, holding a massive, burning cross of black fire that cut through the dark like a brand.

Two thousand miles away, the exact same darkness fell.

Out in the vast, arid expanse of the Mojave desert near Yuma, the blazing afternoon sun didn't set-it was instantly snuffed out. One second, the desert floor was a blinding sea of dust and heat; the next, a suffocating, unnatural midnight dropped over the landscape.

The endless hum of the highway died as the engines of long-haul semis and traveling cars sputtered and stalled out all at once along the blacktop. Drivers stepped out of their vehicles into the sudden, freezing drop in temperature, staring up at a sky that had gone completely blind.

Then, the desert floor shook.

With a silent, devastating impact, another pair of celestial shadows tore straight down out of the black sky, slamming into the cracked earth. The force of the landing sent a massive shockwave of dust rippling across the flats. Out of the blinding debris, two towering, oily silhouettes pulled themselves upward. Just like in Detroit, they locked into a violent, supernatural struggle, their jagged shadow-forms twisting and tearing at one another in the pitch black.

Back in Detroit, standing just inside the glass-paneled door of a dimly lit diner, a seasoned detective stared out into the impossible blackness of the street, his heart hammering against his ribs. He didn't know about the desert. He didn't know about the other cities.

He just knew that looking at the massive, winged shadows waging war on the pavement, the rules of the world were permanently gone. The global battle in the shadows had officially begun.

This gives it a massive, cinematic feel, jumping from the crowded city straight to the lonely desert highway.