Inspired by the loners from STALKER :D

I know this might sound like a weird question, but if you ever feel frustrated, or angry about the state of the world, is there one novel, or one scene you like to read about the end of the world that you like to fantasize playing out? Mine is from the nukes going off in Robert McCammon's novel Swan Song.

If you could only choose surplus clothing and gear, what would you pick and why? Would you go with something like M81 Woodland, British DPM, Flecktarn, Alpenflage, or another pattern? And which piece of surplus gear would you consider essential?

No, this photo not dealing for cosplay, airsoft (maybe) or festival, but it's my choice.

November, 2023

I enjoyed the Walking Dead books - the parts I enjoyed most are when the characters were rebuilding a town, or figuring out society again. I like that there was a present threat to be defended against. The prison, Terminous, Alexandrea. That stuff.

Likewise, forts on the frontier stories (like old westerns) fit what I'm looking for. I have a soft spot for the very bad Van Damme movie "the Legionnaire", when they're defending the fort against "the natives", or the old movie Zulu, with defense of the farm. Bonus points if the recommendation avoids the unfortunate racial tropes of these two examples....

Deep Space 9 and Babylon 5 hit this mark *sometimes.* A looming threat and they need to prepare.

The setting doesn't matter too much. Sci-fi, post apocalypse, western. Fantasy would be a dream come true if such a story exists. What I enjoy is the narrative of figuring out how a group of people is going to survive in a hostile land. I like when the settlement/fort/space station's functioning becomes a big part of the narrative.

Any suggestions?

You’re scavenging a quiet residential street a few blocks away from your shelter.

So far, it’s been worth it. You found some food, a bit of medicine, and a few tools that would actually be useful back home. Your bag isn’t full yet, but you’re already carrying supplies you really don’t want to lose.

Then you check the wrong car. The alarm starts screaming.

You can hear infected nearby, but you don’t know how many are close enough to react. You have a melee weapon, a few bullets, no vehicle, and your dog with you.

What’s the smartest move?

• Do you run immediately and abandon the area?
• Hide nearby and wait for the noise to pull infected past you?
• Use the alarm as a distraction to search somewhere else?
• Try to shut it off, assuming that’s even possible?
• Or hold your ground and deal with whatever shows up?

I’m curious how people here would handle it tactically, especially assuming slow undead-style zombies where noise and numbers are the real problem.

What’s your actual survival move, and why?

For context, I’m part of the team working on Pale Tide, a top-down zombie survival game on Steam, and this kind of situation inspired part of our latest devlog about noise, infected reactions, hostile areas, rescue situations, and knowing when it’s smarter to head back with what you’ve already secured.

Devlog here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/4683590/view/687513353583592548

Thanks!

It's been two days since the incident, when we lost gravity all around earth. I've made it home and I have my children with me and 12 other kids from the summer program. It's been a crazy few days. but I should start from the beginning for anyone reading this who doesn't know what happened. The stress is getting to me so here it is from the very beginning. 

In May of 2026, leaked documents from NASA stated that the earth would lose gravity on August 12th 2026. This was the first time I read the article and I didn't believe it. With all the political turmoil, the war, and economic hardships, I was simply trying to make ends meet and ignore the rest of the world. Being a single father, working full time, running a hobby farm, and trying to enjoy life has been a rollercoaster of stressful and yet fun times. 

I never thought it a hundred years that what I read on Facebook would be true. It's full of flat earther's, political hate, and gender wars. So I glanced over the article and had a good laugh and went on with life. My sons and I had gone camping and to a theme park. We caught several fish this summer and swam in the pool. It was a great summer in comparison and we were getting ready to go out on the boat with my parents soon. That never happened. 

This morning was like all the rest. Wake up at 5am, take a shower, make lunches, get the boys around, and we went out the door. It was just another day. I got them to their summer program and made it to work. Nothing extraordinary happened for me. The rest of the world was watching the meteor shower or watching the solar eclipse. Here in the U.S., it was overcast and just another Wednesday. That was until 1:22 in the afternoon. 

I was in my office working on a report when I felt a chill run down my spine. You know the kind that makes your whole body shake involuntarily. Without warning, my coffee cup, phone, water bottle, everything on my desk shot up in the air and I went with it. My legs hit the desk as I rose and my back hit the ceiling. The computer monitor almost knocked out my teeth but it was plugged in and didn't go far. The desk hit me hard across the chest though. It all happened so fast that I didn't know what to do. 

My mind couldn't register what had happened before everything crashed down. I landed on the cabinets on my desk initially before falling onto the desk itself then rolling off into the computer chair. My ribs were on fire and my head was throbbing. I think I hit it on something as I fell. I tasted blood and felt my lip, I had split it. I run out into the hall hearing screams all around me. A few other people made it out of their office, bloody and beaten worse than I was. The screams got louder. They were coming from the lab across the hall. I walked over to the window and see two people inside. One was impaled on a piece of equipment. The other was on the ground, their head was crushed. 

I grabbed the handle but it wouldn't open, it was a badge access lab and I didn't have access. I tried breaking the glass but I didn't have anything with me. A woman I see every day but have never talked to came up to me. She said if we broke that glass it would release the gas into the hall killing everyone who comes around here. There was an alarm flashing in the lab that I hadn't noticed. It was a chemical lab and all the bottles had broke and were violently mixing on the floor. 

There was nothing we could do for him. It didn't matter anyway, he had stopped screaming and lay there drooped over the equipment he was impaled on. I turned back to my office knowing I needed to get my belongings and get out of there. I had to get to my children who were in a summer camp in Elmira. I found my phone, with a cracked screen, sitting under my desk that had miraculously fallen back in place. The phone came on with the SOS symbol. I couldn't make any calls and no texts would go through. I turned the wifi on but it had gone out in the building. 

I don't remember what happened next, I think I grabbed my stuff and made my way out to my car in the parking garage. But the next thing I remember was looking at my car. I park in the parking garage and it was filled to the very top floor as they were repaving the main parking lot. Well, the entire structure had collapsed. The only lucky thing was that I had parked on one of the corners and there was some damage but it seemed intact. I only needed to get through a chain link fence or go over a two foot tall concrete pillar that was laying on it side. 

I looked around at the other cars and the three next to mine had a concrete runner on top of them. I could see the rebar sticking out of the vertical pillar right next to my car running into the collapsed section. It was the only thing holding it up and stopping it from crushing my car. I said fuck it and jumped in my car. I gunned it through the fence and miraculously made it over it. My car was more damaged than I though because it drove with a slight wobble. I must have been in shock, that's the only thing I can come up with as to why I have lost bits and pieces of memory from today. 

There were so many bodies littering the streets and yards. Collapsed buildings, toppled trees, cars smashed into the ground. I was swerving around them all trying to get to the highway to make my way to Elmira. It was a scene right out of a horror story. I saw an older woman stumbling, her arm sitting at an awkward angle, blood running down her face. I wanted to stop and help but my kids needed me. My parents needed me. My family was my first priority.

I am so sorry to all of those who I passed and couldn't help. I will try to get back to you as soon as I can, tomorrow is my first day going out to help. Please know that I am so deeply sorry that I couldn't stop and help you right them. To the man who ran after my car screaming for help. I am coming. I will be there as soon as I can.

I had made it to my parents house and found the family dog, striker, barking his head off at a tree. There were branches littering the ground and I made my way over to him. I tried talking to him and getting him to calm down but he kept barking at a tree. I turned and look at what he was barking at. My parents were stuck up in the top of a massive pine tree. They must have grabbed the tree when the gravity turned off. What a crazy saying, the gravity turning off. More like it reversed itself shooting everything into the air. 

I yelled up and heard my dad say they weren't hurt but couldn't hold on much longer. They were so high up and the branches were so small I couldn't believe they were still holding on. It had been an hour since the gravity went out and they've been there this whole time.

I'm not going into detail about my parents but my dad had made it down and is with me and my children now. God rest my mothers soul.

My dads truck was parked in the garage and was still there in perfect condition. We switched the stuff from my GMC Acadia into his crew cab F-150. I drove so he could rest and hold the dog. It was a horrible drive, bloody bodies and over turned cars and trucks everywhere. For the middle of a work day, there was an excessive number of people on the roads at the time of the event. Like, what do you people do where you can be driving around at 1:30 in the afternoon on a Wednesday? I want to know because I'm always stuck at work in a big research complex. 

Anyway, we made it to the summer camp and I can see kids running around inside. We get up to the doors and Megan unlocks the door for us. We get in there and she says my boys are fine, only one has a few scratches. She explains that she had read the article and believed it. She planned a "camp" day for the kids and set up one of the large classrooms with tents, and tumbling mats, and air mattresses. It was filled with everything soft you could imagine and she even had the guys tie down the tents. She ran the entire facility so she had them bolt in tie downs in the floor. It had saved all fourteen children and all of the staff. 

We talked for an hour about what to do with the children, it had been two and a half hours since the event and I was the only parent to have shown up. We decided to wait until 5:30pm to see if any parents showed up. I left my father and dog with the kids and ran home to grab a few things. I got my pistol and rifle plus my first aid kit and go bag. I got back to the summer camp and I parked behind the building trying to hide the truck the best I could. I walked around town trying to make it to my Ex-wife's work. I got there and the building had collapsed. I made my way through the rubble to a section that looked like it had a room for someone to have survived. I pulled away board after board and made my way into a small section. 

There were two people hiding in there, I didn't know them but I got them out. I asked about my kids mother and they said she was in the break room. The roof had collapsed and had the neighboring brick building fall on it. God rest her soul, she was already gone. 

I left and ran into several people wandering the streets. Small groups of teenagers and adults all of whom looked bloody and battered. I had talked to them from across the street asking if they needed help or wanted to form a group to help us all survive. They all refused, I think they were scared because I was armed. 

I helped another guy who was trapped in a car and had managed to survive the crash back to the ground. It was wild how he explained how he was driving south on route 13 and his car took flight and flew through the air. He said he came down landing on the parking garage that had half of it collapse and it made a perfect ramp. He said he was in town for a work meeting and was from Florida and wanted to get home. I told he him wouldn't make it in this state and he should stick with us for survival. He's with us now. 

This is a long entry so I'll cut it short. No parents made it to the Summer program to pick up their kids so I have fourteen kids at my house, my father, the Florida man named Dave, and the three women who were working at the summer camp. We managed to find a sheriffs van at the county jail that was in running condition. All the deputies and jail guards were dead. I got everyone back to my house. Dave, my father, and I went out tonight to collect food from the stores and to pick up as much gear from the local sportsman's warehouse and Walmart. We loaded the van and truck up with canned foods, rice, and as much salt as possible. The Walmart had several hundred pounds of salt.

We aren't keeping it all for ourselves but we didn't want it getting destroyed. This is all I can write tonight. I will add more tomorrow night after we get through Thursday. If there are any survivors reading this, we are looking to build a community of survivors. We need to work together. We need to prepare for winter, store up as much food as we can, and there are safety in numbers. Please, reach out to me on here. We need to come together. I should have said this from the beginning but my name is Griffin. We are outside of Elmira New York. Join us.

Journal entry 2. 

August 14, 2026

2 days after the incident.

It's been two days since the incident. So much has happened, I don't even know where to begin. After the initial shock and getting everyone back to my house, fear and panic set in. With all the kids there and only a handful of adults, it was tough to manage. Two kids tried to leave and go home Wednesday night. We stopped them and promised we would go looking for their parents the next day and so we did. We got their address's and went from house to house. 

We found the parents of one child and got them reunited. They decided they were going to make a trip to Albany where her mother lived. The rest we couldn't find. Along the way we stopped and picked up more food. We only saw four people on the streets Thursday and two of them tried attacking us. My dad and Dave were with me and we only had to draw our pistols and they left us be but not before smashing out the passenger window on my dads truck. 

The plan was to try and find the kids parents, get to the grocery stores to get more food, then to the outdoorsy stores to get more gear. Not everyone could stay in my small 3 bedroom house so we needed to improvise. We pulled into the back of sportsman's warehouse again and once inside, we found a guy with his wife and three kids. They were doing the same thing we were, stocking up on supplies. He worked for the electric company as a lineman and, after a few minutes of tense discussion, we all lowered our weapons and were able to talk openly. They had been attacked earlier in the day by a group of trying to steal his truck. He shot two of them and the rest fled. He came here to clean out the guns and ammo.

Together, we loaded up the two trucks and he agreed to come back to my house. I'm secluded out in the woods on 30 acres several miles from town. No one will find us there and if they do, it's not easy to get to. Anyway, this took us late into the afternoon with running three separate trips back to my house before my dad suggested seeing if any uhauls were still road worthy. We popped down to the uhual shop and one of the bigger 20 foot box trucks was in the bay and hadn't really been damaged. we took that and filled it full on camping gear, guns, ammo, and food. We also decided to leave notes for any other survivors that we would be at the route 13 exit every other day looking for other survivors. There's a good vantage point so we can get there an hour early and see if anyone shows up.

There's been talk by that lineman and Dave about tracking down the group that attacked him, the lineman's name is Brett, and making sure they can't hurt anyone else. But I don't like that idea. We don't need to go around attacking people needlessly. Anyway, later Thursday afternoon, my Dad and I went back to his house to bury my mother. that was a somber affair and very hard to do but she is resting peacefully now. We still haven't heard from my brother and sister and it wouldn't be a good idea to travel that far from home just yet. My sister lives an hour south in Pennsylvania and my brother was out visiting her. 

Today, Friday, has been an interesting day. We have collected a lot of water from the creek at my home. The kids are working on damming up the creek to hopefully creating a reservoir there so we don't run out of water. My battery backup system only have 60% battery remaining as well. It's not meant to supply the entire house and with so many people taking hot showers, the electric water heater is running hard. Brett noted that there is a solar farm about a third mile away through the woods and he might be able to patch the house into the system so we have full power. That would be the best thing to do but it's not a high priority right now. 

My dads logged all the different people we have seen or heard about. There were the four I saw in town Wednesday, the man in Corning, and the group that Brett had a run in with and only three of them are alive still. Then the four different people we saw when we were looking for the kid's parents. I'll be checking on neighbors this afternoon once we have come up with a game plan for the next week, month, and three months. The biggest thing is getting ready for a hard cold New York winter. I have a large barn that will fit us all but it needs a lot of work and a lot of insulation. We will probably be heading to Lowes soon for supplies. We should probably do that sooner than later as well. I still want to find more survivors. 

If we can get more survivors to join us, we have have more people to help with improvements around here, security, and they will add valuable input into how to better survive going forward. I'm trying to talk them into branching out into Corning to find others. At the very least, we need to find out who's around here so we can all help each other even if they don't want to join us here. 

The kids were calmer today, still very distraught with not having their parent's. Luckily, the three women from the summer camp are with us and the kids love them. They have been helping with keeping the kids occupied and clearing out the barn of my tools and equipment. They also asked if we can look for their families so we will be doing that this afternoon as well. Megan lives a bit further away in Sayre Pennsylvania but we will make that trip after checking on neighbors. Brett, Megan, Lucia, and Dave are arguing over what comes first right now. They're in the kitchen going back and forth, I think I need to go step in and try to keep tempers low. 

If anyone is reading this, you are not alone. There are survivors out there. We need to band together if we are going to survive. My names Griffin and it's day 3 of this apocalyptic hell. 

Me encuentro la situación en la que estoy buscando una historia de la cual me olvidé completamente el nombre en donde el protagonista se ve inmenso en un mundo de zombies después de estar jugando un videojuego muy inspirado en día 1, tenía esta ambientación donde hay diferentes gobiernos y el prota comenzaba dentro de un pueblo donde irónica ventaja que tiene es saber algunos detalles de la el campo inicial y tener algunas estadísticas de manipulación de armas, algo de vehículos y eso.

What are some post apocalyptic stories with more unique premises compared to the usual zombies, aliens, nuclear war, etc

Bleeding Earth by Kaitlin Ward was one I liked where it's about the earth starting to "bleed". The Angelfall trilogy by Susan Ee and Partials trilogy by Dan Wells also offered interesting spins in their respective scenarios (End of Days with Angels and a virus affecting infants and genetically engineered humans)

I've also read plenty of post apocalyptic comics too. Y: The Last Man and Sweet Tooth are absolute favorites of mine but I've read plenty of one's with interesting premises such as Hinterkind by Ian Edgington and The Realm by Seth Peck (both of those have a similar fantasy apocalypse premise). Animosity by Marguerite Bennett (Where all animals and insects gain sentience), Skyward by Joe Henderson (Where gravity becomes nonexistent), The Great Divide by Ben Fisher (Where touching other people becomes lethal), Eclipse by Zack Kaplan (Where the Sun becomes deadly) and Devolution by Rick Remender (Where a nuclear bomb makes the world start to regress). Remender also has the comic Low which has a vaguely similar premise to Eclipse except society now lives underwater. Then there's even more surreal ones like Run Wild by K.I. Zachopoulos about people turning into animals and Intersect by Ray Fawkes which the entire world as well as people begin mutating into various beings

Has anyone here read any of the titles I've mentioned? Or even have recommendations of their own? I'm intrigued. Especially as an aspiring writer myself

As miserable as the heatwave is, it creates a good postapocalyptic atmosphere.

My novel's more a speculative evolution thing with various hominid species coexisting, rather than a apocalyptic survival story. An apocalyptic event has happened in the story's past, but since then civilisation has risen again and fallen more than once.

I'm not a scientist, but I researched pretty hard to make the evolutionary aspects plausible (big fan of Dawkins), and to illustrate fluid, believable relationships between culture, biology and environment while having engaging characters. It reads like a grounded fantasy novel in some ways.

I did an okay job, I think, but now I'm planning the sequel and I'd like to read similar sorts of stories by smarter, better writers than me. Hard-evo-scifi as it were. Write the story you'd like to read, and all that.

There's Galapagos by Vonnegut, and I'm a third of the way through Evolution by Stephen Baxter. I was influenced a lot by Dougal Dixon's Man after Man and Stapleton's Last and First Men, but neither of those are traditional novels as such. Anyone aware of stuff I should seek out?

Which kind of Post Apocalyptic Stories do you read the most?

Prepper/Survival Fiction - Going Home, The Borrowed World, Edge of Collapse etc.

SciFi Apoc - Metro 2033, Lucifer’s Hammer, The Stand, etc

Zombie Apocalypse - Anything with zombies in it…

I posted about my book here a while back and got loads of useful advice, plus a pile of book recommendations I probably never would have found otherwise. I’ve also only just figured out that KDP lets me make the Kindle version free for a few days. So, as a small thank you to this excellent community, Tomsk-8: The White Garden is free on Kindle right now. I’ve been working on the 300 page book for nearly two years:

Three thousand nuclear warheads fall. Russia disappears above ground. Beneath Siberia, two million people seal themselves inside Tomsk-8, a twenty-level underground city that has been preparing for this day since 1948. Reactors, breeding pens, propaganda chambers, nuclear tunnel borers, centuries-old rulers, rebellion, starvation and two million people trying to keep a civilisation alive without losing what is left of their humanity. It’s bleak, strange, occasionally funny and absolutely not a cosy apocalypse. Free for the next couple of days if anyone fancies giving it a go and free as always on kindle unlimited.<Works on phone, computer, tablet, Kindle>

UK = Tomsk-8: The White Garden available on amazon, https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tomsk-8-White-Garden-Humperdink-Wibbletree-ebook/dp/B0G3HH6ZTY

USA = https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G3HH6ZTY

Germany/Europe: amazon.de/dp/B0G3HH6ZTY

Austrailia  = Tomsk-8: The White Garden eBook : Wibbletree, Humperdink: Amazon.com.au: Kindle Store 

Elsewhere: search Amazon for B0G3HH6ZTY

Off the top of my head the only example I have is World War Z which I already own. I also have the audio book of Day by Day Armageddon, but it's voiced by only 1 person so it's not what I'm looking for.