Novel-novel oleh meshairi

I don't think Caite and I would be ever going to be okay after what she just did to ourselves. She’s insane, for gods' sake! I honestly don’t know who’s crazier—Caite with her sadistic streak, or the people who literally eat other people now.I mean, who in their right mind slices open a corpse just to smear its blood all over themselves? I know she’s smart, but this is too much.She just went ahead and draped guts around our necks, just “to cover up our scents.” Because apparently, to those creeps, we’re just food.Bahala na. At this point, faking it is my only shot at staying alive.A housefly buzzed past my ear and God, it’s disgusting. I hate feeling germy for even a second, and now that I’ve had sticky blood on my face for days, it’s driving me insane.Grilled meat and steamed sausages? Never going to be the same again. I scowled even more because, yeah, I really do smell like the dead. I want to wash my face, but Caite won’t let me. If the world wasn’t ending, I’d have ditched h

The library hadn’t breathed in hours. No more shadows skating across boarded glass. No drone humming overhead. Just me, Caite, and the kind of quiet that made you hear things that weren’t there. My phone was the only thing with a pulse. I found a charger under a mountain of receipts and old ID cards in the librarian’s desk. Miraculously compatible. And I used it the only way I knew how. Beep. The number you have dialed is unavailable. Please try again later. Rina. Britt. Gabby. Call. Redial. Call. Redial. Like if I just hit it fast enough, loud enough, desperate enough—one of them would pick up. One of them would exist. Beep. The number you have dialed is unavailable. Please try again later. “Jane…” Caite muttered without lifting her head. She was buried in books. Anatomy. Molecular biology. Radiobiology. Virology. Surgery. Stuff with words too long to say out loud. Pages spread around her like she was building a nest out of science. “I swear, if I get smarter I’ll ph

“Don’t stop. Keep going,” Caite said like she had any idea what she was talking about.But we kept running anyway.Down the slope, through branches that clawed like desperate hands, mud clutching at our boots, shadows stretching long and mean across the path. Every step felt like dragging the past behind us—blood, screams, the cold sting of names we couldn’t say anymore.Then the forest spat us out onto the cracked edge of the old highway, the bottom city yawning ahead just before dawn. The sky was a bruise. Our lungs begged for mercy. Our legs didn’t listen.“There,” Caite rasped, pointing to a low building half-sunk in ivy and silence. “Library.”We bolted across the empty street. The door creaked open like it hadn’t been touched in years. We shoved it shut and dragged a battered bench in front, the thud echoing too loud. Caite dug a hammer from her pack. We didn’t speak—we just moved, boarding up windows in a rhythm that sounded like panic wearing work boots.She took the left. I t

That night, we moved in the dark.Caite rolled up the maps and tucked them under her jacket. I packed the rations into my backpack, careful not to clink the cans together. My hands were slow, deliberate, like they knew this was the last time they’d touch anything here. Caite zipped up the last of the bags while I double-checked the load. We were leaving tonight. Just the three of us.Tito Weston stood by the edge of the clearing, arms crossed. His face was unreadable, but his eyes… they were tired in a way I hadn’t seen before. Not just sleep-deprived or worn thin from another chase through the woods. This was something deeper. Bone-tired. Soul-worn.“Everything’s here,” he finally said, voice rough. “Food, medkits, iodine tabs, lighter.” He walked over, pulled something from behind his back, and held it out to me. A compact silver handgun. Standard grip. Full mag. Clean. Reliable.“For protection,” he said.I hesitated for a second. Then took it.The weight settled into my palm like

It had been hours since we heard it, but the fuzzy voice through the static still echoed in my mind. ...puso ng isla… sinaunang karunungan… …ang banal na ubasan… magdadala sa santuwaryo It's deep-cut stuff. Only someone born here would get it. And I knew it meant something. It meant refuge. I didn’t tell the others. Not even Caite. But she knew something was up. She kept throwing glances at me across the campfire like she was trying to read a book she couldn’t open. I gave her nothing. Not until we were alone, kneeling beside the gear pile under the tarp. “It’s in Panimo, the island's center,” I told her in a whisper. “Woodpine Valley University is located in there. A safe zone. But the only way in is through the old ossuary beneath the church.” Her mouth parted slightly. “How can you be sure?” “I grew up hearing stories from Lolo. ‘When the light is low, seek God below.’ He said it's a passage they used to say when hiding during storms. Or wars.” “And you just...

Ginny was gone. So was Carmen. Jia too.We stayed in our temporary campsite. Seb had just finished sharpening the edge of a wooden spear. Adrian kept pacing, muttering numbers and map coordinates like they were holy verses. Rory wouldn’t talk. Weston tried, but she stared right through him, like he was air.It was Caite who broke the silence.“We can’t just sit here and cry.”“Who’s crying?” Rory snapped.Caite didn’t flinch. “You, inside.”That shut everyone up.We spent the rest of the day like that—half grieving, half scheming. Chief Andy took stock of supplies while Brie and Mat cleaned what weapons we had left.The drone may be gone, but not our fight. They wanted blood? We were ready to give them hell.Seb pitched noise decoys. Adrian suggested mimicking old military distress beacons. Weston described pressure-triggered tripwires using broken mine casings. Everyone added something. It was messy, desperate, but alive. Something we hadn’t felt in a long time.Then came the questio