Day 1, Year of the Catastrophe – Saturday, 2nd of May, 2020.

Daniel Karstein woke up early. All the rumors and small little fears had taken deep root in his mind. He had even dreamed of dead people walking into his house, although that dream had not seemed that dangerous, since they did not attack him. He rose to his feet and scratched his large belly. He wasn’t particularly hungry, since it was only five-twenty am. Shrugging he grabbed a coke out of the mini freezer that stood next to his bed and took a deep sip of the cold prickling liquid that ran down his throat. He sighed. Soon this would be impossible as many other things. Then walked to the small balcony that was attached to his room and opened the door.

No zombies in sight yet. A seemingly normal day. There had been no meteorite showers in the immediate area either. The closest one he could find online was near Düsseldorf, a large city with around six hundred thousand inhabitants. Although this city was one of several large cities in the Rheinland area a metropolis with around 8.7 million people. Kind of concerning, considering that this was only 60 kilometers away.

More out of habit than anything else Daniel fired up his beloved pc again. Information was power after all, right? It did not took him long to find online sites that shared information on the zombies and what to do. All things considered they walked a bit slower than humans, if the videos were reliable sources. Though, according to multiple commenters they seemed to adjust pretty quickly and apparently Seoul and Tokyo was already pretty swarmed with infected. Running, however seemed hard for them, they mostly walked fast. A few commenters also discussed the ways of killing them and surely enough, those seemed pretty straight forward. Destroy the spine to immobilize them and destroy their heads. A lot of comments also discussed that they are still human and only infected. Daniel didn’t care much for ethics though, he was pretty sure that he was going to be fine with killing someone as long as he was able to survive in the process.

Well, it was good that he was not in the middle of all the mess right at the start. It helped to get situated. He also posted a few helpful links in discord and wrote some alarming messages, hopefully saving some of his friends in the process, but so far no one had been online. Daniel picked up a black pen and a large college notebook and laid back, listening to some music. Survivor by 2wei. It was kind of fitting and lifted his spirits a bit.

He started to map down his living area roughly from google maps and noted important things like cafés, supermarkets and doctors. Also bakeries, banks, hotels, schools and other noteworthy places. His own home was a two story house, 2 bedrooms, a toilet, and a large bathroom and a small storage room upstairs, a spacey living room, kitchen, storage for food and a working room downstairs and a cellar pretty much filled with food that held for a long time, an alternative bedroom for emergency guests and the heating system that ran on oil.

That reminded him… how much was still in that tank? It wouldn’t hold forever, and a warm winter was pretty much a survival necessity. Sighing, he walked downstairs, opened the cellar door and walked right past the storage, that also served as an atomic bunker (a lot of German and Austrian homes that were built around the time of the Chernobyl accident would install something like this to be safe) and opened the door to the heating room. After cleaning some of the dust, he noted the amount down on his notepad. 418 liters of the 740 liter tank were still remaining. Not too bad, if he saved that for the necessary times it should work all the way through winter and then some.

He returned upstairs, checked the discord for messages and then went through his priorities again. Warmth for the winter? Check. Windows and Doors relatively secure? Check. Bunker door was working… Electricity could be a problem though… The freezers downstairs held quite a bid of food as well. Maybe he should prioritize the list after their expire dates? Maybe also calories, just to be able to ration it easier? Daniel sighed. So much to do. He kind of hoped that things would just blow over in a couple of days and that he would be able to return to his beloved shut-in life. If he had wanted to work he would have done so a long time ago!

After a good three hours of counting and rearranging the priorities on his list, he was finally finished:

Coca Cola Cans 0.33l – 180x – Exp. Date: 05/2021 – 139kcal per Can

Coca Cola Cans 0.50l – 31x – Exp. Date: 04/2021 – 210kcal per Can

Red Bull Cans 0.50l – 66x – Exp. Date: 01/2021 – 225kcal per Can

80x Pringles Chips Can – Exp. Date: approx. 4 weeks, stale: ~1 year - 771kcal

12 raw eggs – Exp. Date: 3 weeks – 78kcal per egg

1 large cabbage – Exp. Date: soon – about 250kcal

8 kg of beef, frozen – Exp. Date: depending on freezer – 2.500kcal per kg

1 kg frozen peas – Exp. Date: depending on freezer – 800kcal per kg

3 kg frozen carrots – Exp. Date: depending on freezer – 400kcal per kg

9kg of raw pasta – Exp. Date: approx. 2023 – 134kcal per 100g

240x bottled sparkling water 1.5l – Exp. Date: 06/2022 – no nutritional value

360x 100g chocolate bar – Exp. Date: approx. 05/2021 - 535 kcal per 100g

700g of iodized salt, some pepper and other spices

Daniel scratched his head. All in all he did not really go overboard… Actually he had too little stock for his liking. He had estimated this to get him through at least a year. Though in total this would amount to 335.906 kcal, with an intake of 2.000kcal a day, this would last him about half y year. Well, he could always go and try to loot other houses right? He sighed. Maybe they would still deliver a new order? At least he made sure to have a large amount and variety of shampoo, toothpaste, toothbrushes and floss. Those could be very valuable down the line if he had to trade with other survivors. He hoped at least. He went online and ordered a really large amount of long lasting food, from coca cola to soup noodles and a lot of spices, though he was unsure about delivery. It was Saturday after all.

Maybe he would have to do the one thing he hated the most: going outside. Urgh. Just the thought of it made him want to vomit. He moved that thought a bit away from himself and focused back on his list. He had the immediate area and his defenses listed as well as food and smaller necessities. A big point on his wish list was missing though: weapons.

Guns, rifles and other such things were plenty to find in the U.S. But here in Germany? No such luck, regulation and permits made it very difficult to acquire and own firearms, carrying them openly was an even bigger no-no. The closest army base was in Geilenkirchen, Germany. A NATO-Air Base.

Daniel figured if one could find weapons, they would be there for sure. A journey of 110 kilometers over the motorway. Alpen was really close to an entry to said motorway, but it was impossible to say how much difficulty this route would give him when there were indeed zombies running around everywhere. To be frank, it was probably too risky of an undertaking, especially for an overweight, slow and quite honestly not very skilled fighter like Daniel. There were also a couple of weapon shops in the near area, a rifle maker about 10 kilometers north of Alpen and another approximately 20kilometers to the east. Though that meant going into the city.

Then there was also the problem that Daniel had no idea how to bloody shoot any weapon, much less aim it correctly.

No, food would probably be better in this case anyway. Also, gas for the car would probably be a good idea as well. Daniel scratched his large belly and sighed.

Time to go… outside.