The 5th Wave

But if I'm it, the last of my kind, the last page of human history, like hell I'm going to let the story end this way. I may be the last one, but I am the one still standing. I am the one turning to face the faceless hunter in the woods on an abandoned highway. I am the one not running but facing. Because if I am the last one, then I am humanity. And if this is humanity's last war, then I am the battlefield.

Some things you can never leave behind. They don't belong to the past. They belong to you.

We’re here, and then we’re gone, and it’s not about the time we’re here, but what we do with the time.

How do you rid the Earth of humans? Rid the humans of their humanity.

Cruelty isn't a personality trait. Cruelty is a habit.

I had it all wrong," he says. "Before I found you, I thought the only way to hold on was to find something to live for. It isn't. To hold on, you have to find something you're willing to die for.

Sarcasm doesn't appear to work on him. If that's true, I'm in trouble: It's my normal mode of communication.

You know how sometimes you tell yourself that you have a choice, but really you don't have a choice? Just because there are alternatives doesn't mean they apply to you.

That's what you do when the curtain is falling--you give the line that the audience wants to hear.

You can only call someone crazy if there’s someone else who’s normal. Like good and evil. If everything was good, then nothing would be good.

What doesn't kill us sharpens us. Hardens us. Schools us. You're beating plowshares into swords, Vosch. You are remaking us. We are the clay, and you are Michelangelo. And we will be your masterpiece.

I am a shark, Cassie," he says slowly, drawing the words out, as if he might be speaking to me for the last time. Looking into my eyes with tears in his, as if he's seeing me for the last time. "A shark who dreamed he was a man.

When the moment comes to stop running from your past, to turn around and face the thing you thought you could not face--the moment when your life teeters between giving up and getting up--when that moment comes, and it always comes, if you can't get up and you can't give up either, here's what you do: Crawl.

His heart, the war. Her face, the battlefield.

There's an old saying about the truth setting you free. Don't buy it. Sometimes the truth slams the cell door shut and throws a thousand bolts.

Because we will die, but at least we will die unbroken.

I thought I knew what loneliness was before he found me, but I had no clue. You don't know what real loneliness is until you've known the opposite.

What were they thinking? 'It's an alien apocalypse! Quick, grab the beer!

I didn't save you," he whispers, lips tickling my eyelashes. "You saved me.

I don't care what the stars say about how small we are. One, even the smallest, weakest, most insignificant one, matters.

I don't move. I wait behind my log, terrified. Over the past ten minutes, it's become such a dear friend, I consider naming it: Howard, my pet log.

God doesn't call the equipped, son. God equips the called. And you have been called.

I took one look at it and demanded that he name three things he isn't good at. "Roller skating, singing, and talking to girls." "You left out stalking," I told him as he helped me out of the bed. "I can always tell when you're lurking around corners." "You only asked for three.

When I cry - when I let myself cry - that's who I cry for. I don't cry for myself. I cry for the Cassie that's gone. And I wonder what that Cassie would think of me. The Cassie who kills.

I would kill for a cheeseburger. Honestly. If I stumbled across someone eating a cheeseburger, I would kill them for it.

After another half second, he's locked me in a bear hug, crushing me into his chest and lifting my feet a couple inches off the ground as I kick furiously with my heels, twisting my head back and forth, snapping at his forearm with my teeth. And the whole time his lips tickling the delicate skin of my ear. "Cassie. Don't. Cassie..." "Let...me...go." "That's been the whole problem. I can't.

Is this how humanity waves good-bye? Hell no.

In case you're an alien and you're reading this: BITE ME.