Dane
Lancer
đź““ The Private Diary of Dr. Daniel Richter
You find a battered, cloth-bound diary lying half-buried beneath a rusted drainage pipe behind an abandoned ration kiosk in City 8. The corners are frayed, the spine cracked, and the fabric cover - once navy - is now stained with damp soot and city grime. Someone has torn out entire sections, leaving only a handful of weathered pages intact, pressed between yellowed endpapers and water-warped cardstock.
The front is marked in faint, almost illegible fountain pen ink:
D. Richter --- Private / Nicht öffnen
You thumb through carefully. A few surviving entries remain - dated, ordered, and written in a precise but tired hand. The words speak of another time, another life... one that may not be entirely lost.
You find a battered, cloth-bound diary lying half-buried beneath a rusted drainage pipe behind an abandoned ration kiosk in City 8. The corners are frayed, the spine cracked, and the fabric cover - once navy - is now stained with damp soot and city grime. Someone has torn out entire sections, leaving only a handful of weathered pages intact, pressed between yellowed endpapers and water-warped cardstock.
The front is marked in faint, almost illegible fountain pen ink:
D. Richter --- Private / Nicht öffnen
You thumb through carefully. A few surviving entries remain - dated, ordered, and written in a precise but tired hand. The words speak of another time, another life... one that may not be entirely lost.
---
Entry 1 – July 8, 1998 | Frankfurt am Main
It’s done. I’m a doctor now. Dr. med. Daniel Richter. That feels strange to write.
After six years at Goethe University - bruised by underfunded labs, absent professors, and a degree that earns more eye-rolls than admiration - I graduated. My parents called it a miracle. I call it stubbornness.
Next week I begin my first station: Internal Medicine at Klinikum Frankfurt Höchst. One year there, then Anesthesiology. The thought of holding someone's life steady while they're unconscious still terrifies me - but it also draws me in.
Goethe University isn’t a crown jewel of medicine, and I’ve never claimed brilliance. But I entered this profession for those who fall through the cracks. People like my mother. I won’t forget that.
---
Entry 2 – March 4, 2000 | Frankfurt am Main
Something happened in the United States. Something massive.
Yesterday, reports started breaking about a research disaster in New Mexico. “Black Mesa,” they said. Some underground lab. Initially it was dismissed as an industrial accident - explosions, containment breaches. But then... came the footage.
Strange creatures. Unnatural lights. Something resembling lightning in broad daylight. The U.S. has gone dark diplomatically. Flights rerouted. Military movements escalating.
Today, the German Red Cross briefed us on potential mobilizations. I put my anesthesia year on hold and signed up immediately. I’ve done disaster drills before, but this isn’t a drill. This is real - and we don’t know what it is.
Some colleagues still think it’s exaggerated. I don’t. I saw the eyes of the Bundeswehr liaison. Whatever it is, he’s seen more than we have.
You see a photograph attached to the page...
---
Entry 3 – July 21, 2001 | Somewhere in Baden-Württemberg
The word is “portal storm.” I wish it was still a rumor.
I’ve lost count of the towns. Ulm. Freiburg. Then we were redirected to a relief point near the Swiss border. Now we're stationed near a lake I can’t even name anymore. Every week, we move.
Storms rip open the sky-tearing space apart like paper. Sometimes nothing comes through. Other times, it’s worse than anything we’ve ever trained for. Parasitic things. Insectoid things.
Medicine here is no longer modern. We boil instruments in camping pots. We clean wounds with schnapps if nothing else is available. I’ve amputated limbs in barns with kitchen knives. I’ve buried children.
Our protocols are irrelevant. Our licenses, useless. The only rule is survival. And it’s a rule I barely live by anymore.
---
Entry 4 – May 2, 2003 | Frankfurt am Main (or what’s left of it)
Seven hours. That’s all it took for Earth to fall.
The sky turned black this morning. It began with the rumble of impossible machines, and ended with silence. Striders. Gunships. Creatures that moved like armor made of bone. We fired. We fell.
Civilians tried to flee Frankfurt. I joined a Red Cross column evacuating toward the Taunus. We didn’t make it far. The skyline vanished behind us - swallowed in blue light and smoke.
I stopped treating patients after the second hour. There was no point. Triage implies there's something left to save.
Dr. Breen’s voice crackled to life by nightfall. I recognized him from the initial media articles - former Black Mesa. He told us the war was over. “Peaceful integration.” “Survival of species.” Lies spoken in the cadence of diplomacy.
All I felt was cold.
Another photograph is attached to the page...
---
Entry 5 – October 9, 2004 | Transit Camp, Northern Zone
We don’t use names anymore. Only numbers. Zones. Sectors.
My camp used to be a gymnasium. Now it’s fenced in by metal barricades and patrolled by gas-masked men who speak in numbers. I haven’t seen a stethoscope in over a year. Even rations are handed out through reinforced glass.
Once, I tried to help an old woman who collapsed in the queue. I bent down, just instinct, but a soldier shouted and lifted his baton. I backed off. I watched her stop breathing ten minutes later.
They don’t want doctors. They want order. And silence.
Sometimes I press my hand against my jacket, over where I hid a small suture kit. Just to remember it’s still there. That I’m still someone. Somewhere beneath all this.
---
Entry 6 – December 3, 2005 | Arrival, City 8
It happened again: mandatory relocation. In the dead of night, I was woken by pounding on my apartment door. My heart leapt into my throat because such knocks often mean a loyalty check or worse. Through the peephole I saw two Civil Protection officers in their grimy gray uniforms and gas masks. This is it, I thought – maybe they discovered I was a doctor or found my hidden med kit. I opened the door with a trembling hand. One of them barked in that tinny mechanical voice, “<:: Citizen # 14829, relocation directive. You are to pack minimal belongings and prepare for immediate transfer. ::>” No explanation given, of course.
Dawn was just breaking as they loaded us onto a train at the station. I realized this wasn’t a local shuffle; we were being sent far away. The flickering destination board listed codes and numbers - among them I saw "City 8". I’ve heard whispers of City 8: somewhere in Asia, maybe Japan. The journey was long and suffocating. Crammed into a windowless carriage, people tried to guess why we were being moved. Some speculated our city had reached capacity or that we were suspected malcontents being separated. For me, it was another uprooting just as I’d grown numbingly accustomed to the misery. Still, a spark of curiosity accompanied my anxiety - What is City 8 like? If I recall old geography, Tokyo was one of the world’s largest cities pre-war. Would it be even more populous under the Combine, or in ruins?
... a page is ripped out...
So this is City 8. I don’t know what I expected.
It was once Tokyo. Now it’s scaffolding, drones, and concrete. A giant Citadel dominates the skyline - unfinished but alive.
I was processed at dawn. Registered, photographed, stamped. They assigned me to Complex (Redacted) . Four to a room. I haven’t learned my roommates’ names yet. No one speaks unless forced.
A man on my block limps badly. Something’s wrong with his knee... ligament, maybe. I could help. But I won’t. Not yet.
Still… the itch is back. The one behind my ribs. The one that reminds me: you swore an oath.
---
Entry 7 – January 4, 2006 | City 8
Today, I treated a wound again.
A young guy burned his forearm on a ration boiler. No one intervened. He held back tears. I whispered for him to follow me behind the stairwell, where the cameras don’t reach.
I cleaned the skin with boiled water, wrapped it in fabric from my own sleeve. He didn’t thank me. He didn’t need to.
When I returned to my cot, I unwrapped the cloth bundle at the bottom of my case. Inside was my old stethoscope, still intact. I turned it over in my hands for what felt like hours.
I don’t know what this is yet. A mistake? A beginning?
But if this city bleeds, someone has to treat the wound.
And maybe that someone is still me.
The rest of the pages appear to be empty. Seems like the next chapter is yet to be written...
Entry 1 – July 8, 1998 | Frankfurt am Main
It’s done. I’m a doctor now. Dr. med. Daniel Richter. That feels strange to write.
After six years at Goethe University - bruised by underfunded labs, absent professors, and a degree that earns more eye-rolls than admiration - I graduated. My parents called it a miracle. I call it stubbornness.
Next week I begin my first station: Internal Medicine at Klinikum Frankfurt Höchst. One year there, then Anesthesiology. The thought of holding someone's life steady while they're unconscious still terrifies me - but it also draws me in.
Goethe University isn’t a crown jewel of medicine, and I’ve never claimed brilliance. But I entered this profession for those who fall through the cracks. People like my mother. I won’t forget that.
---
Entry 2 – March 4, 2000 | Frankfurt am Main
Something happened in the United States. Something massive.
Yesterday, reports started breaking about a research disaster in New Mexico. “Black Mesa,” they said. Some underground lab. Initially it was dismissed as an industrial accident - explosions, containment breaches. But then... came the footage.
Strange creatures. Unnatural lights. Something resembling lightning in broad daylight. The U.S. has gone dark diplomatically. Flights rerouted. Military movements escalating.
Today, the German Red Cross briefed us on potential mobilizations. I put my anesthesia year on hold and signed up immediately. I’ve done disaster drills before, but this isn’t a drill. This is real - and we don’t know what it is.
Some colleagues still think it’s exaggerated. I don’t. I saw the eyes of the Bundeswehr liaison. Whatever it is, he’s seen more than we have.
You see a photograph attached to the page...
Entry 3 – July 21, 2001 | Somewhere in Baden-Württemberg
The word is “portal storm.” I wish it was still a rumor.
I’ve lost count of the towns. Ulm. Freiburg. Then we were redirected to a relief point near the Swiss border. Now we're stationed near a lake I can’t even name anymore. Every week, we move.
Storms rip open the sky-tearing space apart like paper. Sometimes nothing comes through. Other times, it’s worse than anything we’ve ever trained for. Parasitic things. Insectoid things.
Medicine here is no longer modern. We boil instruments in camping pots. We clean wounds with schnapps if nothing else is available. I’ve amputated limbs in barns with kitchen knives. I’ve buried children.
Our protocols are irrelevant. Our licenses, useless. The only rule is survival. And it’s a rule I barely live by anymore.
---
Entry 4 – May 2, 2003 | Frankfurt am Main (or what’s left of it)
Seven hours. That’s all it took for Earth to fall.
The sky turned black this morning. It began with the rumble of impossible machines, and ended with silence. Striders. Gunships. Creatures that moved like armor made of bone. We fired. We fell.
Civilians tried to flee Frankfurt. I joined a Red Cross column evacuating toward the Taunus. We didn’t make it far. The skyline vanished behind us - swallowed in blue light and smoke.
I stopped treating patients after the second hour. There was no point. Triage implies there's something left to save.
Dr. Breen’s voice crackled to life by nightfall. I recognized him from the initial media articles - former Black Mesa. He told us the war was over. “Peaceful integration.” “Survival of species.” Lies spoken in the cadence of diplomacy.
All I felt was cold.
Another photograph is attached to the page...
---
Entry 5 – October 9, 2004 | Transit Camp, Northern Zone
We don’t use names anymore. Only numbers. Zones. Sectors.
My camp used to be a gymnasium. Now it’s fenced in by metal barricades and patrolled by gas-masked men who speak in numbers. I haven’t seen a stethoscope in over a year. Even rations are handed out through reinforced glass.
Once, I tried to help an old woman who collapsed in the queue. I bent down, just instinct, but a soldier shouted and lifted his baton. I backed off. I watched her stop breathing ten minutes later.
They don’t want doctors. They want order. And silence.
Sometimes I press my hand against my jacket, over where I hid a small suture kit. Just to remember it’s still there. That I’m still someone. Somewhere beneath all this.
---
Entry 6 – December 3, 2005 | Arrival, City 8
It happened again: mandatory relocation. In the dead of night, I was woken by pounding on my apartment door. My heart leapt into my throat because such knocks often mean a loyalty check or worse. Through the peephole I saw two Civil Protection officers in their grimy gray uniforms and gas masks. This is it, I thought – maybe they discovered I was a doctor or found my hidden med kit. I opened the door with a trembling hand. One of them barked in that tinny mechanical voice, “<:: Citizen # 14829, relocation directive. You are to pack minimal belongings and prepare for immediate transfer. ::>” No explanation given, of course.
Dawn was just breaking as they loaded us onto a train at the station. I realized this wasn’t a local shuffle; we were being sent far away. The flickering destination board listed codes and numbers - among them I saw "City 8". I’ve heard whispers of City 8: somewhere in Asia, maybe Japan. The journey was long and suffocating. Crammed into a windowless carriage, people tried to guess why we were being moved. Some speculated our city had reached capacity or that we were suspected malcontents being separated. For me, it was another uprooting just as I’d grown numbingly accustomed to the misery. Still, a spark of curiosity accompanied my anxiety - What is City 8 like? If I recall old geography, Tokyo was one of the world’s largest cities pre-war. Would it be even more populous under the Combine, or in ruins?
... a page is ripped out...
So this is City 8. I don’t know what I expected.
It was once Tokyo. Now it’s scaffolding, drones, and concrete. A giant Citadel dominates the skyline - unfinished but alive.
I was processed at dawn. Registered, photographed, stamped. They assigned me to Complex (Redacted) . Four to a room. I haven’t learned my roommates’ names yet. No one speaks unless forced.
A man on my block limps badly. Something’s wrong with his knee... ligament, maybe. I could help. But I won’t. Not yet.
Still… the itch is back. The one behind my ribs. The one that reminds me: you swore an oath.
---
Entry 7 – January 4, 2006 | City 8
Today, I treated a wound again.
A young guy burned his forearm on a ration boiler. No one intervened. He held back tears. I whispered for him to follow me behind the stairwell, where the cameras don’t reach.
I cleaned the skin with boiled water, wrapped it in fabric from my own sleeve. He didn’t thank me. He didn’t need to.
When I returned to my cot, I unwrapped the cloth bundle at the bottom of my case. Inside was my old stethoscope, still intact. I turned it over in my hands for what felt like hours.
I don’t know what this is yet. A mistake? A beginning?
But if this city bleeds, someone has to treat the wound.
And maybe that someone is still me.
The rest of the pages appear to be empty. Seems like the next chapter is yet to be written...
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