On the 327th day when the signal was completely annihilated, Chen Yan's fingernails dug a shallow mark into the rust of the satellite receiver. The sandstorm hadn't passed yet, and the leaden wind wrapped gravel and hit the temporary iron shed, making a muffled "clang" sound, which was very similar to the heartbeat of the dying person in the last moments he heard in the abandoned hospital last winter.
Half a bag of moldy compressed biscuits was piled in the corner of the shed. The production date on the packaging bag had long been smoothed away by wind and sand, leaving only the four vague bold words "Emergency Reserve". Next to him lay his old laptop. The screen was cracked with three spider webs. The battery had long since expired and he couldn't even turn it on at the moment - but Chen Yan still wiped it with a cloth every day, not because of nostalgia, but because there was a photo of his daughter sandwiched under the keyboard. In the photo, Nian Nian has just entered elementary school, wearing braids, holding up a perfect test paper and smiling with two small tiger teeth. That was the last picture he received before the signal disappeared.
He can still clearly recall the chaos of the day the internet was cut off.
It was July 15th. It was supposed to be the hottest dog day in the city, but suddenly a cold wind with a rusty smell blew. Chen Yan was watching the morning news in the director's room of the TV station. The female anchor on the screen suddenly paused. She still maintained a professional smile on her lips, but her voice turned into a "sizzling" sound caused by electrical interference. Immediately afterwards, the lights in the entire building began to flash wildly, the surveillance screens went black one by one, the sirens at the broadcast station screamed, and the red warning lights illuminated everyone's faces pale.
"What's going on? There's a power system failure?" The deputy director patted the table.
