Apocalypse Escape: Day One of Survival

Zhu Yong pulled his son quickly into the tent and sat down at a simple little square table on the left.

”Yueyue, come here.” Zhu Yong beckoned to Song Youxuan’s daughter. With his back to Annelina and her family of three, he discreetly pulled half a bottle of mineral water from inside his jacket.

”Water!” The little girl, Su Xiyue, cried out, but her mother, Song Youxuan, quickly covered her mouth.

”Go on, drink up,” Zhu Yong said in a hushed voice, patting the two children on the head.

Yueyue took two sips and quickly pushed the bottle to Zhu Nanxing.

Zhu Nanxing took two sips and pushed it toward his father.

Zhu Yong shook his head. ”I’m fine. I drank plenty in the infirmary earlier and even had an IV with a small bag of glucose.”

Zhu Nanxing raised the bottle high again and offered it to Song Youxuan.

Song Youxuan’s eyes welled with tears. She patted the boy’s head, crouching down to whisper, ”Nanxing, you and your big sister share it. Auntie isn’t thirsty.”

The two children were parched, but they drank with extreme restraint, taking only tiny sips. They couldn’t bring themselves to finish it, leaving a small amount of water at the bottom of the bottle.

Zhu Yong entrusted the bottle with its last bit of water to Song Youxuan for safekeeping. He said to them in a low voice, ”I’m going to take a look around outside and see what’s going on. All of you stay here and don’t move. Wait for me.”

”Master Zhu, be careful,” Song Youxuan said with a nod, watching him leave the tent.

Nearby, the little girl named Annelina was still complaining loudly. ”There are no beds here? How am I supposed to sleep?”

”I told you to bring my princess bed! It’s not even heavy!”

”Will you just shut up!” The girl’s mother, at the end of her rope, slapped her daughter on the head.

Annelina burst into loud sobs, glistening tears streaming down her cheeks. ”I’m hungry! I’m thirsty! I want mango durian cake!”

As Annelina threw a tantrum, Song Youxuan told the two children to sit quietly at the side and began preparing their sleeping area on the ground.

She first laid a plastic sheet on the ground, then spread a picnic tarp over it. A single blanket on top of that would serve as their bed for the night.

”Nanxing, Yueyue, you two go get some sleep.” After two days and a night on the road, almost no one in their vehicle had gotten any rest. The children had to be exhausted.

The trip from the city to Lanshan Lake Base, normally a drive of just over three hours, had taken many times longer.

They frequently had to get out of the car to work together, clearing away rubble, bricks, and garbage that blocked the road.

They couldn’t travel at night—it was far too dangerous—so they had to find temporary places to camp and stand watch while others rested.

But out in the zombie-infested wilderness, no one could possibly sleep soundly.

Song Youxuan gazed at her daughter’s dry, flushed little face, her heart aching with pangs of sorrow.

With no water, she couldn’t even wipe her daughter’s face clean.

There was still half a bottle of sunscreen in her bag, but now she could only use it sparingly.

The backs of her own hands were already dry enough to crack and peel, but she didn’t dare use a single drop of sunscreen. ’It all has to be saved for my daughter.’

The two children lay down on the far-from-soft blanket. The moment their heads touched it, they began to snore lightly.

Even with Annelina still clamoring loudly nearby, the two children were completely oblivious.

Song Youxuan clenched her dry hands, her expression filled with sorrow as she watched the children.

’They were supposed to be little blossoms, studying safely in school, but now they have to face this.’

An hour later, Zhu Yong returned to the tent with some uplifting news.

”At four o’clock this afternoon, the base is distributing one free meal. If you bring your own container, you can also get 200ml of water. It’s to celebrate the new base commander’s first day.”

Song Youxuan was overjoyed. ”Really?”

Zhu Yong glanced at the two sleeping children. ”Here’s what I’m thinking. You stay in the tent and watch the kids, and I’ll go get the meal. It’s one per household, distributed by the lot numbers assigned to each family. I guess we count as a makeshift family now.”

”Okay,” Song Youxuan agreed, nodding eagerly.

”There’s something else.” Zhu Yong leaned closer to Song Youxuan and lowered his voice. ”It’s not very safe here. I was just making my rounds and heard a few families yelling that their bags had been stolen.”

Song Youxuan’s eyes widened.

”So we have to keep a close eye on the kids and what few supplies we have left. There are just too many people here. If anything goes wrong... losing supplies would be one thing, but if we lost the children, it would be a disaster.”

Song Youxuan nodded emphatically. ”Don’t worry. I won’t let them out of my sight for a second.”

Zhu Yong’s voice dropped to a whisper. ”Over at the infirmary a little while ago... I awakened a superpower.”

He held his hand out in front of Song Youxuan, and a small mound of dirt materialized in his palm.

Song Youxuan’s expression turned to one of sudden excitement. She whispered, ”Earth Element?”

Zhu Yong nodded. ”I heard the infrastructure team is recruiting. I may have only just awakened, but I’m an Earth Element user nonetheless. If I can get into the team, our lives will get better. We won’t have to live from one meal to the next.”

”Yu Yue’s mother, don’t worry. As long as Nanxing has a bite to eat, I promise Yueyue will have one too.”

Tears flooded Song Youxuan’s eyes, and she nodded, choking back a sob.

”Don’t cry. We’ll get through this, I’m sure of it. The most important thing right now is to look after the kids. I’m going to check in with the infrastructure team and then get in line for the meal. You just wait here.”

”Master Zhu, please be careful.”

Song Youxuan sat on a small stool beside the mat, wringing her hands together. A feeling called hope, like a sprout breaking through hard soil, seemed to be emerging.

...

On September 24th, the temperature broke forty degrees for the first time.

Even with four half-person-high blocks of ice in the hall, blasted by industrial fans, the house remained unbearably hot and stuffy.

Xie Ning made a major decision. ”Let’s turn on the air conditioning today. Grandpa and Grandma are getting on in years; they can’t handle this heat.”

Song Yaoguo shook his head, waving a hand dismissively. ”It’s fine! Our situation is already great. We even have big fans blowing right on us. In other places, like those small apartment buildings or even the shantytowns, conditions are beyond words.”

”Ningning, you all go on ahead. Don’t worry about your grandpa and me. We already had the cooling agent this morning, plus we have the chilled mung bean soup you made. If it gets really hot, we’ll just have a small bowl of that.”

Song Yaoguo nodded. ”The days are only going to get hotter from here on. We can’t just hide out and enjoy the air conditioning all the time. We may be in our seventies, but we’re still tough as nails!”

Old Mrs. Song nodded. ”Your grandpa and I talked about it. We need to start training more, too. Aren’t you having your mother, uncle, and aunt practice with the punching bag and work on their Fighting Skill in the training room every day?”

”We might not be able to train like you young folks, but we’ll have Xiao Xian get us something to work on our leg strength. We’ll practice every day. That way, if we run into danger, we’ll at least be able to run away and not hold you all back.”

Song Youyi swallowed a mouthful of congee and gave a thumbs-up. ”Mom, Dad, you guys are so enlightened.”

Ji Taixian broke into a huge grin. ”Alright, alright! I’ll set up an exercise bike for Grandma and Grandpa, and get a treadmill too. We can all train together from now on.”