Shannon Messenger Nightfall Novels & Stories

The lights in the dorm of the 6th floor, Room 19 were on, even when it was 2AM. Of course, this wasn't an unusual feat for roommates, Moon Cho-ae and Kim Young-mi, with the latter pulling her infamous all-nighters to maintain her ranking.

"It's way too quiet tonight. Usually, the guy downstairs is gaming at this hour, but tonight there's nothing." I was taken aback. Even with the rain pouring down, he noticed the silence below. Still, he was right. That college student downstairs often blasted his game audio and talked with his teammates on voice chat. Even I could hear it. But tonight, it was just the rain. I texted, "Maybe he didn't game tonight. He could've turned in early." The guy in 603 replied, "Could be, but it's Friday. This is when he'd usually pull an all-nighter."

Instead, they roll around to see if they can see what is in the trunk they can use. Emily manages to free her phone and turn the flashlight on. She can see a shovel, rope, and numerous other items in the trunk with them. She remembers to check the signal strength and finds one bar, so she calls 911. It doesn't go through. She tries again, realizing her battery is at 21%. If it doesn't work this time, then she will have to shut it off for a bit and save the battery. Hopefully, in a while the signal will be stronger.

I said, voice hard, pulling up his encrypted messages—deals with Kael, plans to deliver me, all tied to Lana’s orders. My wolf roared, fury spiking. “Got him,” I muttered, my aura flaring. A ping hit my tablet—a coded message, Nightmoor’s crescent emblem flashing. “I’m with you. —G” My breath caught, Gabriel’s pine scent flooding my memory, his touch in the circle sparking heat. My wolf purred, the mate bond tugging, but Gideon’s growl—“Nightmoor, leave”—echoed, grounding me. “Not now,” I whispered, heart racing, shoving the tablet aside. My duty was Starfang, not him, but his words warmed me, tempting me to lean in. I shook it off, focusing on the broadcast, my fingers trembling.

Cassian’s voice came through the comm in her collar soft, private, encrypted. “They’re calling it the Flood.” Eden smiled faintly. “Not collapse?” “Not anymore. No system alerts. Just… resonance.” “Good.” “How far are you from the node?” “Four blocks.” “You’ll see it before you reach it.” He wasn’t wrong. As she turned the corner, the old broadcast spire came into view once used for Merge training sessions, now repurposed by the people. Screens lit up with personal declarations. Not curated. Not staged. Just raw messages pulsing up the tower like a spine of reawakened memory.

"If we’re going down, I’m taking the whole pack with me!" Lucien leaned closer, his voice a low vibration against my neck. "You’ve turned the most powerful lines in Nightfall against each other, Xender. They’re begging for their own extinction." I watched the screen as the police sirens began to wail in the distance, a symphony of endings. "They were always going to destroy each other," I replied. "I just gave them the tools to do it faster." The screen flickered. A new notification arrived. The Stormriven Den was being stormed by the pack enforcers.

"My professional opinion is that you've been staring at walls for months.” I ignored him and he sighed. Then his phone buzzed and a second later mine did too. Rowan frowned. "That's strange." Yes, it was. The route used to send the message wasn't one of our normal intelligence channels. I pulled out the device and checked it. The message was short, anonymous and untraceable. It was exactly the kind of thing that usually went straight into the trash. My eyes scanned the text. “Christine Hale is becoming established in Moonfall.

I'm quiet because I actually feel guilty about all of this, I feel like I would have been able to do something. “No, that's not it, mom. I'm not scared of the news, and I will not get any nightmares,” I say and mom smiles. “Goodnight honey!” mom says and I wave, “Goodnight mom,” I say. She flips my light switch off and darkness floods the entire room. I turn off my phone and now I'm in absolute darkness, the kind of darkness where I can't even tell whether I'm lying or standing. After a few seconds of counting sheep, I fade. into my subconscious, gradually.

"Make it fast." "We traced the uplink to a regional burst tower," Lucas reported. "We can't get an IP yet, but we have the destination coordinates for the data packets." Nathan’s hand stilled on my back. I felt the tension bleed back into him, turning his muscles to stone. "Where?" "The signal didn't leave the mountains, Nate," Lucas sighed. "The feed was being sent directly into Havenfall." Nathan’s POV The steam from the sunken marble tub swirled around us, thick with the scent of cedar and expensive oils. I sat in the deep water, the heat doing nothing to melt the ice in my marrow. Zack was draped across my chest, his body limp, his eyes staring at nothing.

“Then don’t.” Over the pack lands, Night crept over, shadows stretched all across the porch as Sasha sat by her desk. Her hands shook, not from fear but from the fire that coursed all through her veins. She pulled out her phone, scrolling to a familiar contact: a number with no name, only a wolf’s paw as the icon. Her thumb hovered, then tapped. A message appeared. We need a new plan. Something more permanent. She hesitated only for a heartbeat before finally hitting send.