Novels by Diva_writes

The city had always ignored him. But now, it was looking for him.Oren Vask walked through the outer edges of Cinder Row with Petra Wynn close behind him. The ground beneath his feet was hard and cracked, the same ground he had walked on his whole life, but it felt different now. It felt like he was walking on something that was no longer his. The wind picked up and carried the smell of the settlement behind them, the smell of dust and death and something else underneath that he could not name. He did not turn around. He knew that if he turned around, he would stop. And if he stopped, he might not be able to start again.Petra's voice came from behind him, soft and uncertain. "Oren?" She called.Oren kept walking. "What?" He asked."How far do we have to go?" Petra asked.Oren shook his head. "I do not know. I have never been this far from Cinder Row."Petra caught up to him and walked beside him. "Neither have I."They walked in silence for a while, moving across the open ground tha

The gray morning light was spreading across Cinder Row like something reluctant, like the day itself did not want to fully arrive. Oren Vask pressed his back against the cold stone of the collapsed wall and watched the woman move through the ruins of his settlement.Petra Wynn crouched beside him, her breathing shallow and quick. "Who is she?" Petra whispered.Oren kept his eyes fixed on the woman. "I do not know. But the Codex showed me something about her."Petra's brow furrowed. "What did it show you?""Hold on," Oren said. "Let me ask it."Oren whispered to himself, his voice barely audible. "Codex. Who is that woman? What is she doing here?"The cold blue text appeared at the edge of his vision, sharp and clean against the gray morning.NEW DATA DETECTED. Anomalous biometric signature identified. Subject: MAREN DUSK. Classification: Class-B Analyst. Affiliation: Vael Institute. Note: The Institute has been tracking this bloodline marker for twenty years.Oren read the notific

Petra straightened up a bit with her brows furrowed. "When I saw the old man leaving," Petra said. "He stopped at the end of the row. He turned around and looked back at Cinder Row, and he looked at my house specifically. He was staring at my house like he was looking for something. And like he was waiting for someone."Oren went very still. "He was looking at your house?""Yes," Petra said with a firm nod. "I thought it was strange at the time, but I did not think much of it. I just thought he was looking back at the settlement one last time before he went on his trip to come back soon." She paused, and her voice dropped lower. "But now I think he was waiting. He knew the Purge was coming, and he was waiting for something. Or someone."Oren stared at Petra, and the pieces started to click into place in his mind.The old man had known the Purge was coming. The old man had left a symbol connected to Oren's bloodline. And the old man had been looking at Petra's house, waiting for someo

In Cinder Row, leaving before trouble meant you knew trouble was coming.The wind moved through Cinder Row as Oren Vask followed Petra Wynn through the narrow streets of the settlement where they had both lived their whole lives. The gray morning light was beginning to spread across the broken stone and the collapsed walls and the bodies that still lay where they had fallen, untouched by the Division's cleanup crews.Oren stepped carefully around a body he recognized as old Fenn, who had been lying on his side with his eyes open and his mouth slightly parted, as if he had been about to say something and had simply stopped mid-sentence.Oren looked away."Keep moving," Oren said quietly to Petra.Petra nodded without looking back. "It is not far. The old man's house is at the end of the row, near the old factory wall."Oren followed her, and as they walked, the weight of the night sat on his shoulders like something solid and heavy. Thirty-seven people. He had counted them in the dark,

Oren pushed himself up from the tunnel floor and moved toward the entrance, his muscles stiff and cold from hours of sitting motionless. He climbed up and stood beside her in the thin gray light of the Cinder Row morning."Petra," Oren said, looking at her more closely now. The cut above her eye was fresh. The dirt on her cheek was smeared, not settled, like she had been wiping at it with the back of her hand. "You are alive.""You are alive," Petra said back, her voice carrying the same disbelief. "I thought everyone was dead. I thought I was the only one. I searched everywhere and I called out to people, but there was no one. No one answered."Oren saw Petra's eyes glisten with tears, and she wiped at them quickly with the back of her hand. He wanted to say something to make it better, but there was nothing to say, because the words did not exist."The house," Oren said slowly. "Your house. Your father…""Dead," Petra said flatly. "I found him in the road and he was holding a cup. H

The boots were close now and moving fast along the road above the tunnel, and the scanner clicks were coming at shorter intervals. Oren Vask could hear the shape of the Division's approach pattern the way you learn to hear things when you have been listening for them your whole life."Ten seconds," Oren whispered to himself.The cold blue text was still there, still waiting, and still offering him a chance which came at a cost he did not know about.MISSION STATUS: Survive the Purge Event — ACTIVE.Reward pending: Nullfield Tier One.Cost to activate reward: One minor unidentified memory.Host action required.Time remaining: 8 seconds.Oren pressed his back against the cold stone wall and closed his eyes.He thought about his mother's hands that used to feel so thin and light and strong, holding his in the dark. He thought of her voice that was soft and steady. And her breath that was a little slow, but not scared. Or at least not of this.Oren thought about what the Division would

The white letters still glowed in the air, and Caleb sat on the crate with his hand pressed to his shoulder. Rain ticked on the bay roof, and the damp smell of concrete crept around his boots."You do not have to explain that rule to me, Triage, because I know it better than anyone alive," he murmured at last."I know you do," Triage replied. "That is why I wrote it for you."Caleb rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hand. "Why that rule, and why that one first, when I have a hundred questions about you?" he asked."Because that rule keeps you alive long enough to ask the other ninety-nine," Triage answered. "A medic who is empty cannot help anyone."Caleb gave a slow nod and swallowed against the tightness in his throat. "That is true, and I learned it the hardest way there is," he admitted."Then learn it again, and learn it gently," Triage urged.Caleb ran his thumb along the rough cloth of the sack beside him. "Then I will keep it, and I will keep it hard," he vowed."Good," Tria

Caleb waited with his palm flat on the cold rig, and the red ring pulsed in the dark below the floor. The drip echoed in his memory, and he held his breath."Triage, whose are they?" he whispered again."The sweep reads what is there and nothing more," Triage answered at last. "It cannot read who put it there."Caleb frowned at the empty air where the glow had been. "Then show me the cabinet again, and show me what is inside it," he urged."The sweep is spent," Triage replied. "It fades now, and it will not return today."The red ring shrank to a dot and went out, and the bay looked plain and gray again. Caleb rubbed the chill from his arms and let out a slow breath."Then I need a key and a good reason, and I have neither," he muttered."You have time," Triage offered. "It is not much, but it is something."A woman's cry cut through the rain outside, sharp and high. "Somebody help me, please, my arm is on fire," she called.Caleb grabbed the trauma kit from the bumper and shoved the

The blue number kept counting beside Caleb's shoulder, and the cold side of the ambulance chilled his palm. Rain drummed on the bay roof, and the smell of diesel hung thick in the damp air."Triage, I need to know what we are working with," Caleb murmured."Tell me what you want to see," Triage replied inside his head.Caleb tapped the rig twice and looked up at the dim ceiling. "I want to see what this hospital has in its rooms, because I cannot save anyone with empty shelves," he explained."I can give you one sweep to begin with," Triage offered. "It reads stock and storage, and it does not read people."Caleb nodded slowly and let out a breath. "One sweep is enough, so start it," he urged.A pale blue pulse rolled out from his chest and slid across the floor. It climbed the walls like water, and a low hum buzzed against his back teeth.Caleb gripped the rig and whispered, "That tingles like cold metal on my tongue." The light passed through the brick, the pipes, and the doors, and

Caleb jerked upright with a gasp, and the rough couch cushion scratched his cheek. Rain tapped on a tin roof above him, and the smell of burnt coffee filled his nose.He slapped a hand to his shoulder and pressed down hard. 'The teeth went in right here, and now there is nothing but skin.'"Twenty-two," Caleb whispered, and his voice came out dry and thin.Nobody answered him. A fan hummed in the corner, and a wall clock ticked beside a paper calendar.He held up both hands and began to count his fingers out loud. "One, two, three, four, five," Caleb muttered, and each number shook in his throat."Six, seven, eight, nine, ten," he continued, and then he let out a long breath. The latch on the break room door clicked in the draft, and he flinched at the sound."Your hands are real, Caleb Rourke, and so is this room," a calm voice said inside his head.Caleb froze and stared at the empty room. "You are still here," he breathed."I am always here, because I am made for you alone," Triage

Rain hammered the stone steps of Saint Brigid Hospital, and Caleb Rourke braced his shoulder against the heavy ER door. The metal was cold through his wet jacket, and the smell of antiseptic drifted out from the hall behind him.Marcy Dunn stood just inside with a clipboard pressed to her chest. "Keep it open, Caleb, because I count nineteen people so far," she called over the storm.Caleb did not look back, since his eyes were on the dark street. "Nineteen is good, Marcy, so keep counting out loud for me," he replied.A white-haired man shuffled up the steps with a cane, and Caleb reached out to catch his elbow. "Easy now, Mr. Webb, the stone is slick, so lean on me," he urged.Mr. Webb gripped Caleb's sleeve with a shaking hand. "Thank you, son, I did not think my legs would get me here," he gasped.Caleb guided him through the gap and gave him a gentle push toward the hall. "Twenty," he announced, and Marcy marked her clipboard with a quick nod.Marcy leaned close, and the light fr