Before turning the clothesline pole into a spear, Shao Ming needed to remove the end cap. After all, he didn't want to accidentally cut himself or Li Long while trying to poke through a mutated creature.
He thought back to when his mother had sent him this clothesline pole. She had even shipped it by water transport. The shipping cost had been several times more expensive than the pole itself.
I wonder how things are back home… Shao Ming thought, pulling out his phone. But there was still no reply from his mother. He placed the pole aside and tried calling her.
No answer.
He made several more calls, all of which went unanswered. It had been over two hours since he last messaged his mother. Why wasn't she answering?
A knot of worry formed in Shao Ming's chest. He placed the phone down on the table. It was already 7 PM in Beijing, so his mother shouldn't have been out at this hour.
He picked the clothesline pole back up and twisted the end cap.
Thankfully, after about ten minutes, his mother finally called him back.
Everything was fine at home; they had just gone to collect the emergency supplies. Her phone had died, and she hadn't brought it with her.
Shao Ming breathed a sigh of relief, then took a small knife from the drawer and began sharpening the end of the clothesline pole.
"Hey, look at this." Li Long's voice called from the next room, followed by a notification on Shao Ming's phone.
He opened the link. It was an announcement from the UK government:
"Fellow citizens, we are currently enduring unimaginable hardships alongside other countries across the world. Basic living order has collapsed, and cities have been devastated. Parliament has passed a special law authorizing the military to take control of our cities. We will identify the cause of the outbreak and restore order as quickly as possible."
The full announcement was long, but in essence, it stated that the military was preparing to take over the cities.
"What does this mean?" Shao Ming walked into Li Long's room. "Good news or bad news?"
Li Long shrugged. "Probably good news…?"
Shao Ming clicked through the related news. Someone had filmed the first wave of military forces entering the suburban area of Manchester from the south side of the city.
"I have a question," Shao Ming said. "How many people are there in the British Army?"
"I don't know, maybe 100,000?" Li Long replied.
"100,000 people—how can they handle all the cities in the UK? Even in big cities like London, Birmingham, and Liverpool, each area would only have around 30,000 soldiers," Shao Ming said, calculating.
"You're saying the military might not be able to control the situation?" Li Long asked.
"Seems reasonable to assume," Shao Ming said. "No one knows how many survivors are out there."
Li Long suddenly had an idea, and with a smile said, "Schrödinger's survivor: you never know if they're alive or a zombie until you open the door."
Shao Ming chuckled. "That's true, but even if the military shows up, how are they going to tell who's infected and who's not?"
"That's not really our concern," Li Long said. "I'm more worried about how the consulate is going to come and get us."
"No news yet?" Shao Ming asked.
Li Long shook his head. "No, maybe they're just overwhelmed with emails."
Shao Ming nodded, then said, "You need to change your bandages."
Shao Ming's concerns about the UK military were not unfounded. The British Army had barely managed to quarantine cities, let alone enter and clean up mutated creatures or restore order.
The military had been mobilizing outside major cities, but their orders were not to enter the cities until they had completely fallen. The army was waiting for a few months before entering, reasoning that any survivors still alive by then would likely no longer be infected.
While mutated creatures had lost their sense of pain, they were still made of flesh and blood, so they could be dealt with using high-caliber artillery or armored tanks.
But all of this depended on one key thing: the army had to remain unaffected by the infection.
The internal situation of the military was grim. Many soldiers and officers were showing symptoms of the disease, and several soldiers were working while infected, with only a few reporting their condition. Most of those who did were never seen again.
Shao Ming finished changing Li Long's bandages and prepared lunch before sitting down to scroll through videos.
Life had felt strangely similar these past few days, aside from staying indoors. On TikTok, there were bizarre, abstract "performance art" videos created by humans in the face of the apocalypse. Shao Ming couldn't even look at the corpses outside without feeling nauseous, but watching those videos almost made him vomit.
He found some videos where the military had begun setting up in the suburbs of various cities, but oddly, they didn't seem to be advancing into the cities. Instead, they were securing safe zones in the suburbs and setting up camp.
Was there an outbreak in the army? What was the military's actual goal?
Conspiracy theories began to flood the comments section. Some people tried to rationalize it, saying that many of the soldiers hadn't been infected at first, while others argued that the military wouldn't disobey orders.
But in the current environment, these logical explanations were quickly drowned out by people attacking them. No one seemed interested in being reasonable anymore.
Shao Ming scrolled to the next video. This one showed the British King granting the British Army the royal title.
At this critical moment, the king wasn't offering comfort to the people but instead giving the army a title. Shao Ming found it difficult to understand.
Scrolling through the comments, he realized that there were still plenty of survivors out there.
As Shao Ming continued scrolling, he saw another video. This one showed a young soldier hiding in a dilapidated wooden room. Fear was written all over his face.
"They're not here to save us," the soldier whispered into the camera, "their plan is to kill everyone. All of us."