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Chapter 66
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The 5th Wave, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Trust and Belief
Survival and Perseverance
Warfare and Dehumanization
Family
Summary
Analysis
Cassie and Evan make it back to the ruins of her old refugee camp. They stop to eat and make plans about how to infiltrate Wright-Patterson. Cassie doesn’t have a plan yet.
Cassie’s return to the camp where she once stayed marks her change as a character. She has become more hardened and suffered, but she has also begun to rebuild her life from the ashes by partnering up with Evan.
Themes
Suddenly, Evan notices someone is coming for them and tells and Cassie to stay down. They take cover in a ravine. Frome somewhere above, a flare drops down. Soon after comes a grenade. Cassie shouts, but Evan seemingly doesn’t get away from the blast in time. A figure appears at the other end of the ravine, and Cassie fires her M16 at it. She reloads and doesn’t see Evan anywhere. She runs and all of a sudden hears the sound of an assault rifle.
The confusion of this passage parallels the chaotic scene that Ben and his squad mates faced when they went into combat for the first time. Whereas previously, Cassie faced the dilemma of whether or not to fire her gun, this passage presents an equally complicated challenge of not even knowing where to fire—a situation that reflects how difficult it is to discover the truth in the novel.
Themes
Cassie hears more rifle sounds, followed by screams. Someone is picking off the soldiers one by one. Evan reemerges from the woods, and Cassie realizes he is the Silencer from before. She points her rifle at him.
As the Silencer, Evan not only nursed Cassie back to health from her wounds—he gave her those wounds in the first place. This explains several of the mysteries around him, like why he had the smell of gunpowder on his hands.
Themes
