Zombie Apocalypse: Me and My Cat — Chapter 62

"Jiang Cheng?"

Both Song Jingshuo and Jiang Cheng still had walkie-talkies on them, so Song Jingshuo called Jiang Cheng directly.

Everyone who had a walkie-talkie heard it.

Song Jingshuo asked, "What's going on?"

Jiang Cheng herself was just as speechless. "My phone's been cut off. Ran out of credit."

Several people holding walkie-talkies chuckled. After the laughter died down, they realized the problem.

Sure enough, Jiang Cheng said it first: "This is not a small matter."

Because of the increasing popularity of mobile phones, the rate of landline cancellations had been rising over the past couple of years. Although every household had a phone jack pre-installed in the wall, almost no new homes applied for landlines anymore. And in older homes, many people had already cancelled their fixed-line service.

Because if you didn't cancel, you still had to pay a fixed monthly rental fee. It just wasn't worth it.

Someone cut in: "Mine might be about to run out of credit too."

Jiang Cheng said, "There must be a lot of people. Not just us."

Even though they had walkie-talkies, the building-wide intercom system, and messaging app groups, mobile phones were still an extremely important tool for everyone to keep in touch.

Especially for people who needed to contact their families.

Master Luo and Aunt Pan had just finished watching today's news bulletin and were talking.

"I remember there are quite a few residential areas around Rainbow Sports Center."

"Good heavens, what do we do then? Is the red zone especially serious?"

"Green zones are safe, yellow zones have zombies—this is the first time we've seen a red zone. Must be really serious, right?"

The couple was in the middle of their conversation when Song Jingshuo's voice came through the walkie-talkie, and Jiang Cheng said her phone had been cut off.

The two of them looked at each other. "Is ours..."

"What do we do?"

A moment later, the loudspeaker in the hallway started broadcasting.

Master Luo opened his door and saw that everyone else had opened their doors too, poking their heads out—the speaker was mounted at the end of the hallway ceiling, and opening the door made it easier to hear.

Only Jiang Cheng next door hadn't opened her door.

[Anyone whose phone has been cut off or is about to be cut off, please register on the owners' forum.]

It was the person on duty at the property management center today.

Aunt Pan couldn't help but say, "You know, this interim committee of ours really gets things done fast. If they're on it, they should be able to solve it, right?"

Master Luo nodded. "They definitely will."

Up until now, any problem the interim committee had been made aware of, they'd basically found a way to solve or at least improve.

Everyone had confidence in the interim committee.

Ever since the building-wide broadcast system had been activated, and previous operations were banned from being discussed on the forum to prevent leaks, the forum hadn't been as lively as before.

It was also because messaging groups of various sizes had been set up, along with online chat rooms.

But today it got lively again.

Quite a few people had already had their phones cut off. Some hadn't been cut off yet but were almost there.

Everyone first registered in the relevant thread, then started new posts asking: [What do we do?]

[Just wait. They asked everyone to register, so they must have a plan.]

At this time, you could pay your phone bill at the telecom company's business hall, at a bank, or by buying a top-up card.

The telecom company's top-up card was extremely popular—it wasn't just for mobile phone credit; you could also use it to directly top up some games.

You could usually find them at street newsstands, tobacconists, supermarkets, or phone repair shops. Very convenient.

If you went out from Jixiang West Street, you'd see a newsstand, and there was also a phone repair shop inside the Buyduoduo supermarket building. You could find them in any of those places. So when the interim committee held its core members meeting on Tuesday, the natural proposal was to go outside the safe zone and look for top-up cards.

The interim committee now had more and more members. When they held full meetings, Song Jingshuo's place was starting to feel too small. But not everything required a full meeting. Some things could be handled with just a core members meeting first.

That meant just Jiang Cheng and the six building captains.

As per the usual practice, everyone was free to speak their minds, brainstorm freely, and offer suggestions and opinions. Of course, the final call was Jiang Cheng's.

But this time, Jiang Cheng didn't immediately adopt the simple and easy suggestion.

She sat half-leaning on the dining table, her chin resting in her hand, partly covering her face, as if she was thinking.

Everyone looked at her.

After a few seconds, Jiang Cheng lowered her hand. "Not enough."

"Top-up cards have very small denominations, and there are too many of us. Other than Jingshuo, ninety-nine percent of people will need to top up their credit."

"Huh?" Li Jiangbing turned his head to look at Song Jingshuo. "Why is it everyone except you?"

Song Jingshuo answered flatly, "I have enough credit to last a year."

Everyone: "..."

That would cost a lot of money!

Li Jiangbing's mouth twitched. He didn't feel like acknowledging this show-off any further, and asked Jiang Cheng, "Then what do we do?"

Jiang Cheng looked left and right. "Where's the TV remote?"

Song Jingshuo found the remote on the coffee table. Jiang Cheng said, "Turn on the TV and check something."

Then she added, "The news channel."

The S City temporary emergency committee's news broadcast was only on S City's local channel.

When the TV came on, last night's broadcast was still looping on repeat.

At the bottom of the screen was a scrolling ticker, which had the temporary emergency command center's hotline number on it.

"This is it." Jiang Cheng held out her hand to Song Jingshuo. "Give me your phone."

Song Jingshuo handed it over without a word.

His phone was the latest model—a black business phone, compact, with a cover that could rotate to the top. The lines were sleek and futuristic.

It was the kind of phone whose ads appeared during commercial breaks on many recorded TV programs. A high-end business phone.

It suited his image.

The hotline was constantly busy—just a continuous engaged tone.

At first everyone waited quietly. As time passed, they started chatting among themselves. Then, all of a sudden, it connected.

Everyone went quiet and listened to Jiang Cheng's call on speaker.

The operator's voice sounded a bit hoarse: "Temporary emergency command center. Please go ahead."

"We're the interim emergency committee of the Youth Apartments in the Science and Technology New District. Please report to your superiors that many people's phones have either already been cut off or are about to be due for a payment period renewal or have run out of prepaid credit. Right now no one can go out to pay their bills, and there's soon going to be a large-scale situation where phones get cut off for non-payment."

"I would like," Jiang Cheng said, "to request that the temporary emergency command center suspend the suspension-of-service feature as soon as possible."

"Mobile phones are currently the primary means of communication in urban areas. If people—especially residents of the same residential complex—lose this method of contact, organizing collective actions will become extremely difficult."

"Please, command center, make sure this problem is resolved for everyone."

The operator had spent day after day listening to crying, rage, pleas for help, and complaints. She was completely drained.

Suddenly, a young woman's pleasant voice—calmly reporting a problem, offering a suggestion, laying out the stakes, and expressing expectations—made the operator's spirits lift.

"Understood. The situation you described has been noted, and I'll report it to my superiors right away!" The operator's voice rose in pitch. "Which residential complex did you say you're from?"

"Youth Apartments in the Science and Technology New District. We're the residential complex's interim emergency committee."

Vice Mayor Zheng was resting with his eyes closed. He was utterly exhausted.

He suddenly heard someone speaking in low voices, and snapped his eyes open, catching a glimpse of his secretary's silhouette through the half-closed door, talking to someone.

He waited, and sure enough, after the secretary finished the conversation, he poked his head in, saw that he was already awake, and walked in.

"What's the situation?" Vice Mayor Zheng asked.

"Do you remember the youth apartment complex?" the secretary said.

"I remember," Vice Mayor Zheng said. "That girl, right? What about the youth apartment?"

"The switchboard operator got a call that should be from that girl — a young woman's voice, by the sound of it."

The secretary handed over the folder in his hand.

It was a handwritten work sheet, for status reporting.

Vice Mayor Zheng glanced over it and finished reading in a second.

"I completely forgot about that!" he said. "So now?"

The emergency response team had taken over everything in a rush, with all the critical systems already being maintained — water, electricity, gas, communications. But they'd all been guided by the principle of "keep things running." What they'd forgotten was that water, electricity, and gas are all billed and collected through door-to-door meter checks, whereas communications have a special quirk: the user has to proactively pay or top up themselves.

Everyone slips up sometimes. At a critical moment like this, with the temporary emergency command center just set up, everyone was carrying enormous mental pressure and working around the clock.

Everyone was exhausted.

A lapse like this was normal.

"I've already passed it down just now. They've already started making phone calls."

Vice Mayor Zheng nodded, handed the work sheet back, and added: "Report this to the central government. This should be implemented nationwide."

"Yes, sir. Please get some more rest."

Vice Mayor Zheng nodded, closed his eyes, then suddenly opened them again: "What's the girl's name?"

The secretary quickly glanced at the work sheet, which had a summary of the call, and confirmed: "It doesn't say. She must not have given it — she just identified herself as the temporary emergency residents' committee of the youth apartment."

Vice Mayor Zheng nodded again, and this time he closed his eyes for good: "Let me know when that's sorted out."

The secretary quietly acknowledged, and left.

Over on the other side, a few of the building managers were still discussing: "Can they handle it?"

"They will, right?"

"Hope so."

Everyone chatted a bit more about the issues that had been reported from their respective building units.

"People on floors one and two in our building say the garbage smell from the clubhouse is really strong, especially at night — they can't open their windows to sleep."

"We've got a few night owls in our building who sleep all day and bang around at night, disturbing people — there've already been a couple of fights. I told them if they pick up any wounds and can't explain them at the next gate check, they'll be put in isolation. That shut them up."

Overall, order within the complex was holding.

Various repairs and maintenance were mostly getting done — just that Master Luo was worn out. But now that there were thirteen extra pairs of hands, things should get better going forward.

Compared to all the mess in neighboring complexes, the youth apartment might as well be paradise.

But there was no way to completely avoid conflicts. In fact, the building managers had to deal with this kind of trivial nonsense every single day.

Before, everyone went to work during the day and came home to sleep at night — life was regular, and there wasn't this much time to spend together.

Now everyone was stuck at home, and all sorts of petty crap kept cropping up.

Annoying.

A few building managers gathered together to vent.

Song Jingshuo's phone suddenly rang. He glanced at the caller ID, his expression flickering with mild surprise, and answered: "Hello?"

"One moment, please." Then, wearing an expression of "same as expected," he handed the phone to Jiang Cheng. "It's for you."

"It's the command center."