2025-12-01 06:09:48Asher’s POV
The sliding doors hissed open behind me as I stepped out of the hospital and the world outside slapped me with that same unnatural darkness. The eclipse should’ve lasted five minutes. We were hours in. The sun was still swallowed, the sky drenched in that bruised, reddish glow that made every shadow look alive. Streetlights flickered like they were fighting for their final breaths. My parents were getting worse. No answers. No explanations. Just rising fevers and nurses who couldn’t even look at me. I tried to steady my breathing. Just get home, Asher. Think later. I barely took five steps before a scream tore out across the parking lot. “HELP! Somebody help!” I spun around. A frail man collapsed between two parked cars, shaking violently. His skin was grey, veins darkening. A nurse and doctor rushed toward him. “Sir! Sir, stay with us!” His body jerked harder, unnatural, violent. Another woman nearby held her mother as she wheezed, lips turning blue. “Mama, please don’t do this please” And then it clicked. Everyone falling, Everyone shaking,Everyone gasping for air. All of them were already sick. Elderly. Weak. Chronic illnesses. Cancer. Respiratory issues. Not a single healthy person touched the ground. My stomach twisted. “What the hell is happening…” A sudden wail echoed behind me. I turned and felt the blood drain from my face. A terminal cancer patient from Dad’s ward dropped to the floor, convulsing. A nurse rushed him. “Get me a stretcher! Move, move!” His body arched like something inside was bending him from the wrong angles. Veins pulsed like they were filled with ink. Then his eyes flew open. Pitch. Black. Not pupils, emptiness. The nurse froze. “His eyes… they weren’t like that earlier” His jaw snapped sideways with a loud, wet crack. Not broken. Unhinged. I stepped back, heart hammering. He wasn’t human anymore. He wasn’t some random monster either. It was his illness. Amplified. Mutated. Turned into something feral. Before the nurse could react, he lunged,instinctive, animalistic. He grabbed her arm and bit down hard. She screamed and I swear her veins darkened instantly, spiderwebbing up her neck. “No NO , NO! Let me go! what’s happening?!” Her scream cut into a choke. Her eyes rolled back.And then She snapped her head upright. Black eyes.Jaw loose.A growl vibrated from her chest.“Oh my God…” someone whispered. Chaos exploded like a bomb.Doctors screamed for security. Patients pushed wheelchairs into walls.Orderlies ran for the exits. People shoved, tripped, fell desperate to escape.I didn’t think. I ran.Straight to Ward Three. “Mom? Dad?” I burst into the room Empty.The beds were torn apart. Machines knocked over. IV bags slashed open like someone ripped through in a panic. “No, no, no Mom? Dad!?” A distant scream answered me from the hallway. Then a growl.Then two. I backed away slowly, breathing sharp and uneven. They’re gone.They’re not here. They’re not safe.And neither am I. I pressed myself against the wall as shadows moved past the doorway slow, dragging, twitching. One of the transformed shuffled down the hall, sniffing the air like it was tracking something. Me.I held my breath.Don’t move.Don’t breathe.Don’t exist. The thing paused in front of the room… Head tilting… Listening… My pulse thudded so loud I was sure it could hear it. Another shape lurched behind it, bumping into the wall. They snarled at each other low, animal sounds and staggered away toward the emergency exit. I didn’t think. I bolted. Down the back staircase, skipping steps, sliding on the railing, hitting the ground floor hard enough to twist my ankle. Pain shot up my leg but I forced myself up. Outside, the screaming was worse. The entire town was unraveling. People ran in every direction. Cars crashed into poles. Doors slammed. Windows shattered. Those sick turned ferals wandered the streets, attacking anyone close enough. I ducked behind a truck as one of the transformed past, jaw hanging, breathing like a broken engine. If it bites me… I’m done. No cure. No chance. A woman, one of the patients I’d passed earlier, was on the ground, twitching violently. Her skin was blistered and grayish in patches, veins black and raised like ink frozen under ice. Her eyes rolled back and it was pitch black like the ones in the hospital, and her jaw cracked loudly, stretching wider than any human jaw should. She snapped forward so fast I barely saw it. A man trying to help her didn’t even finish saying, “Are you alri..” before she lunged at him. Her teeth sank into his shoulder with a sickening thunk. He screamed, but she didn’t stop. Her fingers twisted like claws as she held him down, tearing into his flesh like a starving animal. Blood sprayed across the pavement, steaming under the red eclipse. I stumbled back, my stomach knotting in horror. The man convulsed violently. His eyes bulged, then glazed over. A foamy mixture of blood and something darker dripped from his mouth. And then… he stopped. For three silent seconds, he lay still. And then He twitched. Once. Twice. His spine bent upward unnaturally, limbs jerking like a broken puppet. His skin tightened, mouth stretching until his lips split from the corners, exposing long, sharp teeth that hadn’t been there before. He turned toward me. Red eyes. Sunken sockets. Hunger so raw it looked like pure instinct. “No… no, no, no” I whispered. He darted toward me on all fours, so fast the ground seemed to shudder beneath him. I ran. I sprinted across the parking lot, dodging between cars as more screams erupted, people being dragged, ripped into, devoured. These creatures weren’t slow, they were fast. Too fast. Their movements jerky but impossibly strong, like their bones no longer obeyed human limits. One of them pounced onto the hood of a car beside me, denting the metal with terrifying force. Its face God, its face was a nightmare skin peeled back around the mouth, eyes glowing faintly under the red eclipse, saliva thick and dark dripping from sharpened teeth. It sniffed the air, then shrieked. I fumbled with my car keys, hands trembling, heart hammering so hard my chest hurt. I unlocked the car, threw myself inside, and slammed the doors. The creature slammed into the window instantly, shaking the whole car. “Shit! Shit!” I screamed, fumbling to start the engine. It dragged its cracked nails across the glass, leaving long, white scratches. Behind it, two more were feasting, literally feasting on someone who hadn’t run fast enough. Their teeth tore through flesh like wolves ripping open a deer. My stomach churned. Tears burned my eyes. I got the engine to roar alive. Hands gripping the wheel, shaking, I reversed hard, swerving as the creature lunged again. The whole town was chaotic. Cars crashed into poles. People ran in every direction. Ferals tackled them to the ground, tearing and biting, transforming people within minutes under the blood red eclipse. I sped out of the hospital lot, tires screeching, heart hammering, and whispered shakily to myself: “What the hell is happening to my town?”
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Chapter 16
Serena’s POVThe road bent north, thinning into cracked concrete bordered by dead fields and rusted signposts. We’d been walking for hours, too tired to talk, too tense to relax.The nests were behind us, but the weight of them walked right beside us.Asher limped a little. Elara watched every shadow. Kane kept glancing over his shoulder like he expected something to follow.Nia held onto Elara’s sleeve, quiet as ever.I kept my rifle ready.The eclipse-light didn’t fade. It never did. But the deeper we went, the darker it felt as if the sky itself was warning us to turn around.We didn’t.We couldn’t.About an hour later, Kane slowed.“Wait, look there,” he said, pointing through the broken fence line.Behind a cluster of collapsed trees and vines, a shape stuck out large, rectangular, metallic. Not a vehicle… a structure.A building.Concrete walls. Reinforced windows. A faded blue sign tilted sideways.Elara squinted. “What is that?”We stepped closer until the letters came into v
Chapter 15
Serena’s POV***********The Next “Morning************“As soon as we’re outside, stay close,” I told them, tightening the strap of my rifle. My voice came out steady , it had to. “We follow the highway north. No detours unless I say so.”Kane opened his mouth like he wanted to give direction, but one sharp look shut him up.He adjusted his glasses instead, muttering something about observation protocols.Asher leaned against the cart for balance, still pale under the red light. “I’m fine,” he murmured when Elara fussed over him.“No, you’re not,” I said, stepping beside him, “but you can walk, and that’s all we need right now.”He nodded once.We pushed the carts out of the ruined supermarket and onto the cracked street. The moment we stepped outside, the world hit us silent, abandoned, coated in that sick eclipse-red glow that made every broken building look like it was bleeding.We followed the cracked highway out of town. About an hour into the walk, I noticed something.A low
Chapter 14
Dr. Kane Malric’s POVAsher hit the ground so hard the entire aisle shuddered.For a second, none of us moved.None of us breathed.Serena’s gun hung uselessly at her side now, her arms shaking too much to aim even if she wanted to.Elara just stared at his collapsed body, hands trembling.Nia whimpered into my shirt, hiding her face.And me…I stared at him like he was the final page of a book I had spent my whole life trying and failing to write.Immune.Transforming.But not turning.Asher’s body lay crumpled against the cracked tiles, chest rising and falling in uneven, shallow breaths. The red-black shadows of the ruined supermarket still flickered through the broken windows, and the smell of burnt blood and sweat clung to everything.I swallowed hard. Years of lab experience didn’t prepare me for this not the Eclipseborn, not the Eclipse, and certainly not someone like Asher. He was… an anomaly. A walking, breathing unknown variable, a puzzle I had no frame of reference for.El
Chapter 13
Asher’s pov The wall behind me vibrated with every breath I took.I wasn’t sure if it was the building shaking or just my bones grinding against themselves, desperate to finish shifting—or to tear themselves apart trying.The worst part?I couldn’t tell which outcome I wanted.My hands dug into the tiles, cracking them. The air was thick with blood, dust, and that burning red light that felt like it was crawling inside my skull.I squeezed my eyes shut.Hold it. Hold it. Don’t lose them. Don’t lose yourself.But the monster inside me was pacing. Thrashing. Tasting the fear in the air like it was fuel.“Asher,” Elara whispered.Her voice was too soft. Too close.“Don’t,” I growled no, snarled. “Elara… stay back. Please.”My throat felt stretched. Wrong. Like two voices were fighting to speak through the same mouth.Serena still had the gun trained on me, knuckles white around the grip.Kane tried to whisper something to calm her, but he sounded like he was trying to calm himself more
Chapter 12
Asher’s povDarkness squeezed around me like a fist.Not peaceful darkness.Not sleep.This was heavy. Suffocating. Burning.Like something was coiled inside my chest with red-hot wire, wrapping around my ribs, crushing, tightening. My veins felt like they were sizzling under my skin, boiling from the inside out.Am I turning?Is this it? Is this what it feels like right before you become one of them?A strangled breath tore out of me, raw and animal, as awareness slammed back into my body like a punch to the ribs.I gasped, choked, then shot upright so fast pain ricocheted through my spine.The world hit me in broken fragments.Red eclipse light pouring through the shattered supermarket windows.Shelves knocked over.Debris everywhere.Serena shouting something, her voice sharp, panicked.Kane swinging a metal pipe like he barely knew how to hold it.Nia crying somewhere behind the crates high, terrified little sobs.And thenThree Eclipseborn.Not the normal ones.No.These things
Chapter 11
Elara’s pov The supermarket was too quiet.Nia slept huddled against a threadbare blanket I’d spread across the floor between two empty shelves. Her small chest rose and fell slowly, oblivious to the chaos outside. For a moment, I let myself believe the red eclipse couldn’t touch her here, couldn’t reach this fragile pocket of safety.Then it came, the screaming.Faint at first, ragged and jagged, like metal being torn apart. My stomach tightened. My hand gripped the knife so hard it ached. Nia stirred, murmuring in her sleep. I leaned down, brushing her hair from her face.“Shh… it’s okay, Nia . I’m right here,” I whispered.The screams grew sharper, closer, as though something, someone was running for their life. Then a single gunshot rang out, followed by another piercing scream.My blood ran cold. The door rattled violently. Someone was trying to get in.“Nia ! Behind the crates, now!” I hissed, yanking her into the shadows behind a stack of empty boxes. Her small hands
