Chapter 62

• The armored truck rumbled through the dead streets, its engine the only sound in a world of ash and silence. The diary was open on my lap, its worn leather a fragile anchor in the overwhelming grayness.
• “This is it,” I said, my voice a tinny buzz over the helmet comms. “Northwood Preparatory Academy.”
• The school rose from the ash like a ghost ship. It was pristine. Untouched. No scorch marks, no collapsed walls. Just a perfect, three-story brick building sleeping under a blanket of gray dust. A sign, its blue and gold letters miraculously clean, read: `Home of the Fighting Wolves`.