Call Me Daddy

“But now that the power and signal are still out, what should be done with the wild boar?”

Someone in the village spoke up.

Times had changed. Decades ago, wild boar had been a common food on their menu. According to the older generation, during the famines of earlier years, the village would form hunting teams to capture wild game in the deep mountains. Catching a wild boar would mean a feast for the whole village. Even during the early days of the Republic, people from the village would hunt wild boars. Those who caught the boars got the main parts, while the leftovers, such as offal, were distributed to other villagers.

However, regulations had tightened over the years. Wild boars had become a protected species, and hunting them in the mountains was now illegal.

But the rules weren’t absolute. There had been times when wild boars had become a nuisance, overrunning the mountains and descending to ravage the villagers’ fields and steal crops.

These pests destroyed crops and wasted food by eating only a few bites of each sweet potato, leaving much of it behind.

Moreover, when these animals appeared, they usually came in groups. There had been incidents where wild boar herds had nearly cost lives while destroying crops. On one occasion, the Agricultural Bureau had invited experts, and they concluded that the boar population had become too large and disrupted the local ecological balance. Wild boars weren’t particularly valuable or rare, so the decision was made to have the armed forces come in, killing a number of them and leaving only a small group in the deep mountains.

In the past 20 years, including this incident, there had been only two instances of wild boars coming down from the mountains. The last one was a lone young boar, which the villagers had collectively killed because it posed a serious threat to their safety and property. In such emergency situations, they were not held legally responsible.

The body of that young boar had been taken away by the Forestry Bureau, which said wild game wasn’t to be consumed due to concerns about unknown viruses from animals that hadn’t undergone any health checks.

Nowadays, no one was lacking meat. So, while the villagers found the sight of Deng Caihua’s 200-pound wild boar remarkable, they weren’t particularly tempted by it.

The appearance of the wild boar likely served as a reminder that wild boar populations still existed in the mountains. Anyone going up to forage for bamboo shoots, mushrooms, or wild vegetables should be cautious and avoid venturing too deep.

***

“By the way, the village chief still hasn’t returned,” someone reminded the group.

Everyone then recalled the inconveniences of the power outage, lack of water, and signal issues.

“It’s almost time for lunch,” someone noted.

Nowadays, people used electric rice cookers for convenience, and very few households still had traditional clay stoves.

But this wasn’t something that couldn’t be resolved. At worst, they could use a pressure cooker or a clay pot to cook rice, as long as the gas canisters at home were usable.

The problem was the water outage. They would need to buy extra bottled water from the convenience store to cook and prepare meals.

“Back in the days when I had my phone with me, if my son didn’t call me for a few days, I wouldn’t have felt anxious. Now that there’s no signal and I can’t get in touch with anyone, I’m even more worried, constantly hoping for the signal to come back so I can call him.”

The speaker was a woman of similar age to Deng Caihua. Children of their generation rarely stayed in the village.

Most young people nowadays were working in the city. Those who remained in the village tended to farm the land, and unless they were involved in large-scale operations like contracting orchards or fish ponds, staying behind was seen as a sign of lack of ambition.

This was also why, when Su Aobai suddenly resigned and came back, Ma Aifang was so keen to get the young man a job, eager for him to venture out and make a living.

Her words struck a chord with Ma Aifang. Since the previous night, she had also lost contact with her son.

It was normal to go a few days without contact, but now with no signal, the inability to reach him made her anxious. She worried about what might happen if something went wrong while they were out of touch.

Ma Aifang’s son and his family lived in the provincial capital of a neighboring province, requiring plane or high-speed train travel. Driving would take at least 8 or 9 hours. If something happened and they couldn’t get in touch, it would be agonizing.

The villagers, who had been buzzing with excitement over Deng Caihua killing the wild boar, fell silent, each preoccupied with their own worries.

“Hey, it’s not like the signal won’t come back. Maybe soon the electricity, water, and signal will be restored. Don’t you know how efficient our country is? It might just be a temporary issue with the power plant or signal tower that’s being fixed.”

Someone shouted to comfort everyone. There were occasionally long outages of water or electricity, and this time, it was an unexpected signal outage, which made people especially anxious.

“That’s right. Everyone should go back and cook first. We’ll leave the wild boar at the village committee for now. If the signal doesn’t come back soon, we’ll find a tricycle to take it to the Forestry Bureau.”

“Yeah, it’s okay. Don’t worry too much.”

As the comforting words continued, before the crowd could disperse, Su Aobai returned in his car.

“It’s chaotic. This power and signal outage isn’t just happening here; it’s occurring across the entire country, even globally. No one knows the cause, but we should prepare for the possibility of prolonged outages of water, electricity, and signal.”

Su Aobai got out of the car and directly shared the news he had heard from his older brother with the still-gathered crowd.

This revelation shocked the villagers who had been trying to reassure themselves.

What did it mean for the entire country, or even the whole world, to experience power and signal outages? What did preparing for prolonged outages mean?

What on earth was happening in the world?

***

“Give me five barrels of rapeseed oil and two cases of noodles!”

“Get me two cases of salt and one case of sugar!”

“This’s what I saw first. Why are you grabbing my stuff!”

“No one’s grabbing your things. I clearly got it first. If you have time to argue with me, you might as well get another one. There are more on the shelf.”

The previously sparsely populated commercial street suddenly became crowded with people who had come to shop after hearing internal news. This scene was occurring in many other stores that were still open.

Among them were also people from Tuanjie Village.

They had been skeptical of Su Aobai’s words, but when they heard that it was Su Yiqing who had passed on the message, they believed it more. Then, not long after, the village chief had returned from the town and county with news that confirmed what Su Aobai had said—that the city was experiencing power and water outages along with no signal. That added more credibility to Su Aobai’s words.

Village chief Deng Guohua acted decisively and instructed the villagers to quickly buy essential supplies. He advised them to buy things they were sure to need and items that wouldn’t spoil easily. That way, even if the water, electricity, and signal were restored later, they wouldn’t suffer too much loss.

Many of the villagers were elderly and not accustomed to using mobile phones, so they still relied on cash payments. At least having cash on hand wasn’t a problem now.

However, most of their savings were still in the bank, and the cash they had wasn’t enough to buy much.

Deng Guohua advised them to buy as much as their cash would allow and to act quickly. Since the news had already reached their village through Su Yiqing, it was likely that others had learned of it through their own channels as well.

If they waited any longer, they might not be able to buy anything.

The village chief was right. People were prone to panic in groups. Those who were initially skeptical of the rumor and were observing became more inclined to join the frenzied shoppers when they saw the crowds.

Because many young people didn’t have cash and there was no network access, aside from those living near the commercial street, others couldn’t view live updates or photos online. This helped prevent widespread panic.

However, even a small number of people could cause a lot of disruption.

The government responded quickly. Police were stationed outside the operating commercial streets and small supermarkets to maintain order. Anyone caught taking advantage of the situation to steal or loot would be immediately arrested.

With armed police standing nearby, those who might have considered causing trouble became more subdued. Moreover, since it was only the first day of the disruption, people didn’t appear as panicked as they might have felt. Deep down, they still believed that water, electricity, and signals would eventually be restored. Therefore, while they were hastening to stock up on supplies, there were no real disturbances.

But Su Aobai knew that this peaceful situation wouldn’t last long.