Once We Lived in Nanjing

Ban Xia, clenching a handheld flashlight, gingerly unscrewed the screws and removed the casing of the radio.

A tiny silver key stuck to the inner wall of the radio's outer casing, accompanied by a yellowed note with drunken scrawl: Your New Year's gift.

Indeed, it was a generous gift.

She held the key in her palm, examining it closely. It was not much larger than her thumb, yet it carried weight, heavy and noticeable. The smooth silver metal casing, resembling a USB flash drive, had an interface at one end, which was sealed with a white, semi-transparent plastic cap. She took off the cap and sniffed close to the key's interface.

No smell.

It was hard to imagine that this thing had always been there—inside the radio, inside the room, within reach, staying with her for so many years.

Throughout countless days and nights, the girl and it had lived and slept together, clearly old friends who had accompanied each other for years, yet she had only just recognized it.

"Let's get acquainted," Ban Xia held it up with a pinch, raised it high, and playfully said with one eye closed, "Mr. Key, for all the years you've stayed here, I won't charge you rent."

The only method that could fully meet all requirements was to hide the key in the Icom amateur radio, and Elder Bai was soberly aware of this point. If any micro-electronic device could still operate normally after twenty years, it would undoubtedly be the TURNFIVE radio in Bai Yang's bedroom, signifying that the radio's internal environment remained stable over the long twenty years. As long as the mainboard of the radio was intact, then the key would be unharmed.

Elder Bai succeeded, although at this moment he lay in the hospital, vomiting and suffering from diarrhea, unable to remember what he had done.

This twenty-year operation of a nuclear strike had finally had its last piece of the puzzle completed.

That night, both the drunken Bai Zhen and the pleasantly surprised Ban Xia didn't have a chance to ponder such a question:

If Bai Zhen had let Ban Xia open the radio before hiding the key, Ban Xia would have inevitably failed to find the key, and the sound they heard might indeed have been from a loose screw.

But if he told her where to find the key after hiding it, the noise would have been attributed to the key.

Just the difference in the order of actions could lead to two entirely different outcomes. If parallel universes exist, in one universe Ban Xia finds a key when she opens the slow mail package, whereas in another universe, a Ban Xia finds a screw in the same spot.

What does this suggest?

It suggests that information changes facts in the process of transmission. In Ban Xia's unobserved black box, the source of that sound might exist in a superposition of the key and the parts. Different pieces of information sent from twenty years ago have made the tinkling ghost within the radio choose differently, falling towards different realities.

In the process of communication with the future, information is shaping reality.

36 hours until the nuclear weapon's countdown unlock.

Sunlight sneaked through the gaps in the living room curtains, casting thin strips that quietly crawled onto Ban Xia's filthy jeans. She sat cross-legged on the floor, chewing on sweets she had learned to make by heating a mixture of honey and pine resin — this snack-making method was taught by the command center. The old men at the command had assembled a team of survival experts specifically tasked with teaching girls how to survive in harsh natural environments.

However, the experts they found were retired reconnaissance soldiers. These people were skilled at surviving in the wild, mastering techniques such as how to make fishhooks from zipper pulls and can tabs, how to make a compass from disassembled speakers of old cellphones, and how to start a fire with wood friction... Obviously, Ban Xia's survival environment was not that extreme; she was surviving in a city of ruins, with ready-made lighters available for starting fires.

Ban Xia, with her mouth full of candy, tore open a worn plastic bag and rolled it into a rope.

She was busily transferring supplies, packing up her food and drink tightly, strapping them onto her bike, and moving eastward. Following the guidance from the expert team, she was preparing enough food and fresh water for three days to a week. After a nuclear explosion, one should stay as far away from ground zero as possible and should not approach within a five-kilometer radius of the explosion site within seventy-two hours after the event; the straight-line distance from Xinjiekou to Meihua Villa happened to be five kilometers.

In other words, after the nuclear blast, she needed to find a place to hole up for a week before she could return home.

There were several options for this temporary hideout: Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing University of Technology, or Jiangsu Province Agricultural Research Institute. A university campus would be a good place to stay, as campuses were relatively feature-rich and complete miniature societies before the end of the world. Ban Xia could find a classroom or a dormitory to live in. There were also recommendations for Southeast University, as someone from the expert team was an alum and had a deep, albeit fact-ignoring, affection for their alma mater. This suggestion was ruthlessly PASSED by the command center.

"We are still researching the residual radiation dose within the city after the nuclear explosion," said Bai Yang to the girl, "to ensure it doesn't have a significant impact on your health, OVER."

"What impact would that be?"

"Radiation sickness, and cancer, OVER."

"Cancer?"

"Yes, long-term exposure to ionizing radiation can cause cancerous changes in body tissues, also known as malignant tumors. You can think of it as a lump growing inside the body, incurable, almost always fatal, OVER."

"Long-term? How long is long-term?"

"Two to three years, or maybe three to four."

"Then it's still early," Ban Xia reassured herself, "Three years is such a long time. Why should I worry about something that'll happen three years from now?"

She felt three years was an eternity away, so distant that she couldn't even glimpse it on tiptoes. Who would worry about what could happen in such a distant future?

This was not a world where time could be counted by years. She could only think about what to do in three days, in thirty days, at the most three hundred days. No further.

Gasping, the girl moved all her belongings downstairs, piling them up in the stairwell, then stood there with her hands on her hips, patting her palms together and taking inventory. There were salted fish, smoked meat, wild vegetables, and several large water jugs, all tightly bound with zip ties and hanging from both sides of her bike's rear seat. She wondered if she really needed to eat that much in seven days; she wasn't a pig.

But Bai Yang told her to take more with her. He said food could also be contaminated by radiation, and contaminated items could not be consumed as it could lead to internal radiation exposure.

Compared to Bai Yang, who blanched at the mention of nuclear threats, Ban Xia was much calmer. Hearing that the effects of a nuclear explosion on her would only become apparent over years, she became fearless, even feeling like humming a tune. There were so many terrifying things in the world that could snatch your life away in an instant, and in comparison, nuclear bombs were practically gentle.

No wonder they called her Ms. Qiu.

Ban Xia fished out a key from her pocket, feeling its icy coldness. For some reason, this object never warmed up in her possession.

The countdown to the nuclear bomb unlocking was entering its final 24 hours.