RadZakpak

Hey everyone, it's been a while... again. Truthfully I kind of lost my mojo with this story for a while, and it took a long time for me to get back into it. But, I have good news: 1. I have gone through all 23 chapters and edited them for a combination of clarity, consistency, and continuity. Gone are many grammatical errors and awkward sentence structures. I also made sure that things previously unclear in my writing should make a little more sense, and there shouldn't be anymore continuity errors with certain characters. For example, recently I've gone into how Schuster studied Chemistry heavily, and it is his passion, yet I forgot that in early chapters I say Schuster doesn't know much about Chemistry, and Groph does. Now Schuster loves Chemistry the whole way through. 2. I am also introducing a new concept to the structure of the book: Story Scraps. These Scraps will be short messages, letters, or diary entries placed between chapters to add some depth to the world or shine a spotlight on minor characters without taking up more space in a normal chapter. Currently, I have added only three, and one is simply a Schuster diary entry that used to be a part of the main chapter, and two are data servant entries. I have several others planned, some even between chapters already written, so look forward to those. 3. I have had issues with updating the storybook through this site, and while that is currently being worked on, I have made a google doc for the storybook with handy navigation tools, and you will have the ability to comment anywhere on the page to ask me to add more clarity or fix errors. Here is a link to the doc. Don't worry, this is not the version I will be working on, so go crazy adding what you want! Go here for the version with all the updates for now. 4. Chapter 24 is being written right now! I will add it to the doc once it is ready.

So with the release of Alpha Omega, there are of course going to be new additions to the story, and I knew that at least some of the changes would conflict with the story I planned on telling. Thankfully, it doesn't change a whole lot that is already written. Richtofen's story remains the same, but Alpha Omega did a lot with Cornellius Pernell and Peter McCain, two characters who previously had little to no known backstory so I saw fit to fill that in. I had a plan for where the two characters would eventually go narratively, but some of that is now changed. For now, I'm going to designate the current Peter chapters as non-canon until I can find a clear path I want to take with them and the ones I had planned. I was afraid with his revival by Pernell and immediate joining of Broken Arrow that Peter would turn out to be just a follower and not someone who would do anything for the greater good. But that quickly changed as he reported his old friend to the DoD as he was clearly a danger to those around him. Anyway, initially my plan with Peter was going on a few missions in Europe before ultimately preparing to infiltrate Group 935. His mission was to learn what he could about the Wunderwaffe and progress on the undead army. After being transferred to the Verruckt facility, he would discover that Group 935 is barely in control and call for Pernell to send the extraction team. Only then does Pernell reveal that his mission is actually to recover an Elemental Shard that scientists as the asylum are using to try and control the dead. Peter believes it should be destroyed, but is ordered by Pernell and his superiors that that is the priority over anything else. Peter is subsequently captured, however the outbreak worsens and Peter breaks free, losing his arm in the escape. He commandeers a plane and receives the last transmission from Pernell telling him to rendezvous at the Rising Sun Facility. As Peter prepares to jump with the shard and the experimental Mk 3 weaponry, he decides to the shard is better off in no one's hands, leaving it on the plane as he parachutes down. Unfortunately the chute malfunctions and he dies having destroyed the shard. In Book 5, Peter awakens in a city surrounded by fire. There are winged beasts flying through the sky, and he is on the ground, his parachute having been activated. He comes to realize he is in Stalingrad, and is soon chased inside a building by the undead. They are too strong and break inside, not before he sees a bright flash of light and feels his body becoming weightless. He awakens again in what looks like a castle made of stone. The open sky is exposed, but there are no clouds. Only a bright, blue orb in the sky surrounded by stars. He hears voices, yelling, shooting, explosions. He grabs his weapon, exploring the ruins, before discovering it is connected in some way to a building made of wood. He steps inside, revealing a massive auditorium, a theater. As he gazes upon the projection screen, memories flood into his mind: There's a pain around his neck, a gasping for air. He sees himself hanging from a rope, his arm missing. Four men are looking at him as he swings limply. Again he feels weightless, and there is a flash. All he sees is utter blackness, before finally, he falls to a stone street. There's Jazz music in his ears, and there are hundreds of people walking along the sidewalks around him. The air is cool and the night sky illuminated by the street lights. The people's faces, however, are blank. No features whatsoever. None of them speak. Just walking. Peter follows the source of the music and finds himself in a club. The people within this club have faces, all smiling and chatting away as they drink. There is a lone couple dancing in the center of the club, slowly. An older, bald man with a white beard, and a young brunette in a dress. Peter, still wearing his marine uniform covered in dirt and soot steps up to the couple, who stare at him, confused. The room fades as the couple approach Peter. They reveal themselves as Dr. Maxis and Sophia. Peter says he was told to find Dr. Maxis, and asks him where they are. He reveals that they are inside the Summoning Key. Inevitably, The Great War, now the Final War begins to defeat Doctor Monty with Primis and Ultimis leading the charge. They would enlist the help of former associates across dimensions, including SOPHIA, Maxis, and Peter from within the Key. I won't go into all that since it doesn't seem to be going that way, but Peter would reunite with Pernell... who I didn't think would turn out to be a bad guy, but hey... So yeah, anyway, I'll probably focus on finishing Richtofen and Maxis' journeys, and then worry about Peter, if at all. I might just delegate Peter to side material for the sake of length and consistency.

Ah, I’ll need to update the mobile menu when I get the chance. I always forget.

Glad you enjoyed! Yes, those 46 chapters + prologue and epilogue are my plans for Book 1 as a whole. But I do have another chapter planned that I want to put in somewhere, and when I get around to a planned chapter if I don’t feel like it will make a good chapter I may scrap some.

Chapter 23: "Alone" is now up! https://www.callofdutyzombies.com/story/book1ch23/

After a long wait, here is Chapter 22: "Watched"! This is from the view of Doctor Maxis as he presents the first milestone in the project to control the undead to General Lehmkuhl. I hope it was worth the wait. The next chapter is certainly going to be a departure from the norm as well, hopefully in a good way! Thanks!

Chapter 21: Departure is up! https://www.callofdutyzombies.com/story/book1ch21/

Chapter 20: "Uniform" is up! Times are changing! (Literally...)

Chapter 19: Sacrifice is here! https://www.callofdutyzombies.com/story/book1ch19/ This is a spicy one, for more than one reason. Also if you are squeamish about blood/dismemberment, maybe you can skip a few lines near the end of the chapter.

Howdy! I have added Chapters 17: "Semper Fi" and 18: "Pressure" to the site! Chapter 17 follows Peter, now invited to be a member of the American intelligence-gathering organization, the OSS. Chapter 18 follows Doctor Schuster as he and Doctor Groph discover something incredible regarding the MPD. We're getting into the really gritty, fun bits of the story coming soon. I am really looking forward to it! I also added the names of upcoming chapters to the side bar mostly as a sort of code name system for me to keep up with what chapters are coming. They may or may not stay the same when I eventually write the chapters.

I think Honor's Suffering has a lot of potential and I may start writing it soon. Zetsubou has such a great atmosphere and the story I had planned would tie in so well to Primis' arrival to the island in Book 4. As for Jeb Brown, I really look forward to writing that one because its connections with the rest of the story are minimal and I did have some chapters planned out, I just needed to iron out a satisfying ending. With the Vietnam story I've debated placing some of that story as chapters in Book 2, I just have to work out some kinks with the timeline and how I will want that book to be structured. Definitely something Grief-related would be very interesting. I have something similar planned for Book 3 with the Victis crew proving themselves against another group of survivors to win Richtofen's favor, but with completely unknown characters could prove interesting, and maybe set up some of the backstory behind Green Run before Victis' arrival. I would certainly like to see some of the ideas you had for your creation. Peter is certainly intended to keep the reader grounded in reality with someone far more relatable than Richtofen, who while he starts with good intentions, he is a genius and you can't quite predict what he will do next. A problem I don't want to run into with Peter, however, is having his chapters just be about him finding out information we, the reader, already know and only by the end will he be caught up before he dies. People tend to dislike stories where the main character just goes through everything they already went through when learning about the world. So it is important that I find a way to have Peter learn things that Richtofen, nor the reader knows to keep things interesting. I also do not want to detract from the Richtofen story, as his and Peter's only intersect at one point near the end. Peter's story should have an impact on the entire series to justify him standing on the same level as Richtofen, Schuster, and Maxis as main characters in this story. I definitely have a lot of that planned for Book 2 and portions of 3. In Book 2 we will follow, along with Ultimis, Cornellius Pernell as he tries to create Broken Arrow, the threat of Samantha is realized, and as he heads Broken Arrow early in the Cold War. Portions of Book 3 involving Russman will be interspersed with flashbacks to his missions as an agent of Broken Arrow (Think Men In Black). For this reason alone I have thought of Russman as my favorite member of the Victis crew. So many years behind him he barely ever mentions...

Just want to update that I have been working on the next chapter of Book 1, not up yet. I think I'm going to try and wait until I have a couple of chapters done before uploading. Because I tend to finish one, upload, then just wait a while before beginning the next one because of the satisfaction of posting about a new one. Also I'm a bit anxious as we get further in to the real meat of the story because so much could change with the next two DLC's lore wise. Summer is almost here so I should have a good amount of time to get a good portion of Book 1 done. In the meantime, I want to ask, what are some side stories that you guys want explored that I can work on when I'm not really feeling like working on the main story? I'd like to revisit the Attack on the Pentagon and Whispers of Morg City to update them with new lore, but there may be more stories I am not thinking of that would make for a good short story to tie into everything else. I think if the Marvel Cinematic Universe has taught me anything it is that if you want a big interconnected universe with branching paths and teams of characters, you need to start with small and personal stories, which is what I hope to do with Richtofen's story in Book 1 before he becomes as important as he is. Also, what do you think of Peter? I know I haven't written much of him yet, and the next chapter is about him, but what more do you want to know about him? How do you relate/not relate to him? Is he boring or intriguing? What situations can you see him in as a spy in the OSS?

You and me both. I just get this sneaking suspicion as I spend hours working on these chapters that I'm going to have to make a major rewrite after these new maps release... I'm sticking to Pre-World at War content for now in the hopes not much of that is revealed, but any question could be answered at any moment or any existing character completely ruined. I got really lucky with Classified that it seemed to fit with my plans very well to develop Pernell more, and Schuster's character in radios is still consistent with my work. I just hope Treyarch can hold off on answering SOME questions so there is room to speculate even when it is all over.

It's certainly possible years down the road! For now I want to focus on Aether since the story is coming to an end, and it will take a long time before it is complete. But if by then I really enjoy where the Chaos story is headed I would write one for it.

Chapter 16: "... I Will Build My Church" is now up! It's got everything I love: character development, a little action, world building, and of course, monologues!! Also, Edward Richtofen! In all seriousness, I hope people like this chapter. Elements of it have been brewing in my head for a while and I can't wait to see where these characters go.

Definitely! Living people are much more interesting in some ways because there are many responses one can have to being attacked, while a zombie just keeps going until it has nothing left. On the other hand, zombies allow for more brutal and creative deaths without the question of morality. It really comes down to a chapter’s tone and the character we are focusing on. I am sure Tank Dempsey takes much more pleasure in killing the undead.

Greetings! Here is Chapter 15: "Hard Landing". Peter McCain must now enact the daring escape plan with stolen documents that could change the tide of the entire war. I must say, I was not looking forward to writing this chapter after Little Resistance, because I didn't really have any idea how I wanted it to play out. I just knew I needed Peter to escape and get to Corregidor. But I actually quite enjoyed this one, and it felt like writing an Indiana Jones adventure in a way. I'm hoping Peter's character pans out well, as he is my first attempt at a main character who did not already have a personality established in the lore. I have big ideas for his future. NOTE: There is a minor scene of brutality in the beginning, not quite as bad as the last chapter, but might still be too much for some. Again, the Bataan Death March was a real event and the severity of the war crimes should be remembered. This is a work of pure fiction, and in no way is meant to downplay to reality of the situation. These characters are not based on real people. Also, in other news, I have updated Chapter 1: "Danke Schoen" of Book 2. The story is pretty much the same, but I have tweaked a few minor things, as well as completely overhauling the dialogue with Richtofen and the voices in his head. I spent some time recently outlining where Book 2 is headed, and while it is not final until the Aether story is complete (Damn you and your new deep lore, Treyarch!), I know that I want the voices to serve as an antagonist in Book 2 rather than assisting Richtofen. I think the new version is much better.

I should explain better, I don’t necessarily mean that they should all be equal, but a majority of my chapters are about 3000 words, which is normal as for novels the are between 2500-5000. But novels like that tend to be 22-25 chapters, and cutting out stuff I deemed uneccesary, my current outline has Book 1 being 50 chapters plus a prologue and epilogue. With an average of 3000, that is 156,000 words. According to articles I have read, a majority of first sci-fi novels in a series are around 100,000. Any more than that and you lose interest in any publishers reading through it. That’s not to say a novel can’t be that long. One Harry Potter novel is 257,045 words, and The Fellowship of the Ring is 187,790, but those books were written by already established authors. Anyway, don’t worry, I won’t be holding back on gory details and encompassing the whole story as I will not be concerning myself about word count. But if I ever did want to adapt this into an original story and publish it, it would require heavy editing.

Here is the next chapter, Little Resistance. It follows Peter McCain in his earlier missions as a Marine in the Pacific front. https://www.callofdutyzombies.com/story/book1ch14/ WARNING: This chapter takes place during an event known as the Bataan Death March. It was a war crime by the Japanese in which thousands of American and Filipino forces were forced to endure six days of walking to a train station in San Fernando, where they were then packed into trains and shipped to cruel internment camps. This chapter has some brutal death based on real life atrocities committed by the Japanese during the march, so if you are faint of heart, read carefully, and I understand if you cannot read any further. I will put up a disclaimer for chapters like this. There is humor in this chapter, as Peter is meant to be a man who uses humor to cope with pain and stress, but this is not meant to downplay to importance of this real life event. As another note, this chapter is a bit shorter than some previous chapters, and while writing it I was doing a lot of reformatting of my plans for each chapter in this book. I kept trying to cut out chapters to have an average page length more like that of a real novel, as if I keep the chapters as long as they have been the book would be much too big. But then I thought, I really shouldn't be doing a disservice to this story by omitting so much, especially since I am posting it here where there is no limit. From now on I am going to ignore any thoughts about a chapter being too short/too long or being unnecessary to the overall book because if I try to think too far ahead I will end up stifling what I can do with this story. Of course, if I ever did release a physical version of this book, I would change a ton, and write a whole second draft that is more concise, or I would split it up into two books. But for now, I'm going to remain somewhat unpredictable.