Europe was one of the first places to fall. The Z-Virus began at Brekka Station, a research station on an island off northern Norway, in March 2035. A supply helicopter carried it to Tromso, and flights carried it across Europe in weeks. By the end of 2035 almost every big city was dead. Thirty years later, the safe places are islands, mountains and the cold north. Salt Fleet ships link them by sea. Credits, Chits and Scrap are used in every stronghold.
Iceland shut its ports in 2035 and hunted down every infected person by 2037. It is clean. Reykjavik is the seat of the Northern Commonwealth and the home port of the Salt Fleet, with about 60,000 people. Geothermal plants such as Hellisheidi give heat and power. The Faroe Islands, reached through Torshavn Harbor, are also clean and part of the Commonwealth. Every ship is blood tested at the Old Harbor.
The cold is the best weapon here. The dead freeze solid for months each winter, and that is when crews clear towns. The Northern Commonwealth holds Tromso and the north coast of Norway. It keeps boats away from Brekka Station, where the station archive may still be. The Svalbard Seed Vault is guarded by the Commonwealth. Oslo is a walled settlement around Akershus Fortress. Stockholm and Copenhagen are dead. Kiruna Winter Camp in Sweden is the base for winter clearing crews. Helsinki is a Gate Compact stronghold of about 20,000 people on a peninsula, with the island fort of Suomenlinna. The Vaalimaa Border Post holds the road against the hordes of dead Saint Petersburg.
Tallinn is a walled old town, cleared from Helsinki in 2043. Riga and Vilnius are dead cities, worked by clearing crews in January. Forests and bogs cover most of the land. Hordes cross from Russia when the ground freezes. The Gotland Ferry Wreck in the Baltic Sea still holds cargo and dead.
London is one of the biggest dead cities on Earth. Pickers at the Thames Barrier Camp run boats up the river. Wembley Stadium holds the largest nest in Britain. Deserters hold the Dover Castle Tunnels and tax the Channel. Scotland, Orkney, Shetland and the west of Ireland survived best. The Aran Islands are clean, and Dublin Port Wall is a Salt Fleet stop.
Paris is a dead megacity. The Stade de France holds the largest nest in Europe, and the Catacombs run under the south of the city. A small crew lives high on the Eiffel Tower. Brussels, Berlin, Madrid and the Dutch cities are dead. Much of the Netherlands flooded when the pumps stopped. Mont Saint-Michel, Gibraltar Rock and the Belem Tower Dock in Lisbon are safe stops on the coast. The heat of Spain and Portugal turns many dead into Husks.
The Alpine League is the strongest power in Europe. In 2035 the Swiss army closed the passes, and people went into the fallout shelters under every town. Bern is the League capital, with about 25,000 people. The League guards every pass. Grimsel Pass Fort watches the road over the mountains, and the Gotthard Tunnel Nest is sealed with thousands of dead inside. Vienna, Prague, Budapest and Berlin are dead. Salvage crews hold the Vienna Flak Tower and Prague Castle. The Hallstatt Salt Mine sells salt to the League. Ramstein Air Base in Germany is held by deserters.
Rome is a dead city, but about 400 people live inside the walls of Vatican City. Venice survived on its islands. Many Greek and Croatian islands were cleared after 2040, and Hydra Island Town and Dubrovnik trade with the Salt Fleet. Nicosia on Cyprus is a Gate Compact stronghold inside old stone walls, with a quarantine quarter for Mutated in the old buffer zone. Lifeline runs the Akrotiri Donor Camp on the south coast of Cyprus. Raiders in fast boats hunt traders along the coasts.
Mountain villages survived best here. Belgrade, Sarajevo, Tirana, Ljubljana and Tbilisi are small walled settlements. Most other capitals are dead. A great horde follows the Danube each spring, from Vienna past Budapest and Belgrade to the Iron Gates Dam, which raiders hold for its power. Rila Monastery in Bulgaria takes in travelers. Old minefields still kill in Bosnia.
Moscow is one of the largest dead cities on Earth. Crews only enter in winter, when the dead freeze, and they camp in the Kremlin. The Moscow metro never freezes. Kyiv, Minsk and Warsaw are dead. Two hot zones make Ukraine dangerous, the Zaporizhzhia plant that melted down in 2037 and the old Chernobyl zone. Wild bison roam the Bialowieza Forest. Kronstadt Island and the Murmansk Ice Port are small clean towns in the north. The Cricova Cellars in Moldova hold 500 people underground.
Istanbul, Ankara and Baku are dead. The dry plateau of Turkey holds many Husks. Raiders hold the Bosphorus Bridge and tax boats in the strait. Survivors live in the Derinkuyu Caves, an old underground city. Yerevan and Tbilisi are walled settlements. The Metsamor plant in Armenia melted down in 2037. The Oil Rocks, a town on stilts in the Caspian Sea, sells the only fuel in the region.
Zombies cannot swim. They sink and walk along the bottom. Ships are the safest way to travel. The Salt Fleet sails from Reykjavik to Lisbon, Gibraltar and the Mediterranean. The Baltic freezes in hard winters, and crews cross the ice. The Black Sea is quiet, since the dead of Istanbul drop from the Bosphorus bridges onto passing boats. Pirates use the Crimea Gas Rig as a base.