“Let’s have breakfast.” said Mike as he looked at the sweets in front of him. Currently, they were sitting in the basement with everyone around the table.

Mike, Daniel and Carmen were in the same side, with the other two in the other.

“So, we have weapons, when are we going out.” said Mike with a smirk.

“Idiot, it’s not as simple as that. We have to train hard first.” said Jaime as he took a bite from a chocolate bar he was holding. “If you can’t even handle the recoil, you’ll end up dying.”

“I don’t have to train, unlike you.” said Emi from his side while sticking out her tongue

“No, you’ll have to spar with me.” said Jaime as he took another bite.

“Jaime, are you insane? She’s a martial artist.” said Daniel with a worried expression.

“You know fully well what I’m capable of.” said Jaime with a bored voice.

“But you can’t use your ruthless tactics on her!” shouted Carmen.

“That’s not quite true. Do you think the zombies will go easy on you just because you’re a woman? You’re sorely mistaken, so just shut up and train as I say.” said Jaime while glaring at Carmen and Emi one at a time.

Mike then broke the silence “So, what’s the training regimen?”

“150 push-ups, sit-ups and 1000 laps around the garage. Then Mike will use the training guns in the basement for practice, Emi and Daniel will take turns sparring with me, Carmen will then run another 1000.” said Jaime with a serious tone.

“We’ll die if you make us do that.” said Carmen.

“You’ll die either way if you don’t train, so think of it as an investment for the future.” said Jaime.

Thinking back, he didn’t have such a luxury as training and only fought off zombies day and night, resulting in his fine physique. But it wasn’t balanced, so he wanted to sharpen his friends and himself to the limit this time around.

The rest of the breakfast was passed with talks of weapon tips by Jaime. Although he wasn’t a weapons maniac, his practical knowledge was irreplaceable to newbies like his group.

He was thinking of going out a week from now to stock up on food, so he had to train diligently. The bunch was already on the first floor and were preparing for their harshest training in their life in an hour from then.

Jaime took the lead and started running. But after 20 minutes, he almost dropped to the ground. He had only run 150 laps around the small garage. ‘This physique won’t do.’ he thought.

Jaime then stopped and rested for a minute before continuing it. Daniel on the other hand, was fine for 400 laps and soon took a rest, while Jaime had taken 3 and Carmen had taken 5.

Emi took her first on the 600th and the hellish running concluded in 5 hours, at 2 o’clock in the afternoon.

“Ok, let’s take a break for an hour before our second part of training.” said Jaime.

“So much for a big mouth like you.” said Emi with a smirk, who was red as a tomato. But the others weren’t to judge, as they were far worse.

“I just had the idea, not that I did it before.”

He then noticed that the screaming was almost none existent so he walked towards the second floor sloppily. Then he looked through the windows and saw that the zombies had vacated the district and so did the humans.

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“Hmm, I guess they are looking for food somewhere else.” said Jaime as he approached the others.

“Let’s eat some real food.” said Mike with a frown.

“We have to save it, idiot.” said Daniel as he hit him on the back of his head.

“No, Mike’s right. We won’t get muscle mass without it and the electricity will go out soon anyways.” said Jaime as he thought of the contents of the fridge. There was some meat in the freezer part and some canned food and salads.

“That’s right, without eating well, we can’t become stronger.” said Emi approvingly.

“I only brought them in case of emergency when we are trapped for long periods of time.” said Jaime “There is a stove in the basement, so we’ll drink boiled water for a while. We don’t want our water supply to go dry, do we?”

“I’ll cook.” said Carmen as she happily climbed down the ladder into the basement.

‘Ugh, these idiots are too calm. Having weapons doesn’t make you invincible; it just helps you a little bit. But this is a little better than the super depressed type.’ thought Jaime as he sighed.

Daniel said “I’ll help.” and rushed to the basement too.

“That guy was crying a few hours ago by the way.” said Mike while approaching Emi “You don’t like crybabies, right?”

She just sighed before punching him in the abdomen. “I might think of becoming your girlfriend if you beat me.” she said with a smirk and a sarcastic tone.

“Well, Jaime became an ultra-sadist so he’ll make us monsters in a few months, so we are a guaranteed couple.” said Mike, giving her a thumb up.

“Just so you know, I trained for 10 years.” she said with an angry look.

“Woah, you look cuter when you’re angry.” said Mike with a smile. Of course the natural reaction would be a blush. “Now you look even cuter.”

“Fuck off!” she shouted and punched him away.

“You can beat him up all you want, he’d be into that. But all I ask of you is to settle your family businesses quietly.” said Jaime after hearing her shout.

Then Emi grew even more flustered and punched at Jaime.

He easily sidestepped and sent a roundhouse kick to her head.

Emi dodged at the last moment by ducking. “Are you crazy?” she said, trying to suppress her voice as much as she could.

“Yes, and I’d advise you to not do that in my presence.” said Jaime.

…

“Wow, you made this from canned food?” asked Mike with a surprised tone.

“Of course, I’m the one who makes all the stuff when you come over.” said Carmen with a big smile.

“I had no idea.” said Mike as he drooled while looking at the food before him. It was something that resembled the food you buy in restaurants. It was made with the canned beans, corns and some rice. Of course, the main character was the meat.

“We’ll have to finish all the things with expiration dates before eating the other ones, so we’ll have to scavenge once a week.” said Jaime, breaking all the fun.

“Oh, there’s a zombie apocalypse going up there.” said Carmen with a sad voice.

“I’d like you not to remind me of that, please.” said Daniel.

“Me too.” said Emi with a frown.

“It’s reality, we can’t run away from it for long. If we do, it’ll come back to bite us.” said Jaime with an angry voice while slamming his hand on the table.

“But we don’t have to be so pessimistic, okay? Maybe it’ll go away one day.” said Carmen with a sad voice.

‘They actually are depressed, huh?’ thought Jaime with a sad face, thinking of his past. He tried to join every resistance movement, but they just kept falling one after another.

“What’s this doing here?” asked Jaime as he looked at a radio placed on the table, it was an old one.

“In case there is a distress call, we’ll have to hear it.” said Mike while eating a spoonful of the food in front of him.

“They might win the battle, but not the war. We’ll just have to survive the war, that’s all.” said Jaime with a strict voice.

“But the merrier it is, the better, isn’t it?” asked Daniel while taking a spoonful.

“No, it’ll just make us bigger targets. By the way, we’ll save only one more person any more than that, we can’t handle, I’m afraid.” said Jaime with his normal tone.

“That means we must conserve our free member spot for someone useful?” asked Emi.

“Yes, that would be the most logical choice.” answered Jaime.

It took them 5 more minutes to finish off the plates before them, and the part 2 was about to start.

The push-ups and sit-ups were done in pairs of 10, with minimum rest between them. As expected, Carmen was the first to drop out, after 5 sets. Mike and Jaime stopped at 7 while Daniel and Emi kept at it until 10.

“You’re a maniac, you know that?” asked Daniel as he lied looking at the ceiling, his muscles refusing to move.

Then Emi continued “I thought my master was harsh.”

“Let’s not train, I’ll be the cook? “asked Carmen with a sigh.

“No, if you can’t run away, then we might leave you.” said Jaime.

“I know it’s for us, but don’t you think this is too tyrannical?” asked Mike while looking at him in a strange way,

“Not really, or do you want the zombies to coach you?” asked Jaime while looking at them with an evil smile.

“No thanks.” they said almost semilationously.