Chapter 50 Water and Power Outage
"Dad, I put the coffee table away."
Shen Xiaoxiao blinked and tapped her finger twice on the black card.
In the blink of an eye, the 1.5-meter-long gray marble coffee table appeared in front of the three people again.
In the living room, except for Shen Xiaoxiao, Shen’s father and Chen Juan all looked stunned.
After a while, the two looked at each other and finally accepted this shocking fact.
Their daughter really had an invisible space, as if she had hooked up with a powerful organization.
Father Shen took a long time to calm down, and finally said with difficulty: "Xiaoxiao, this doesn't cost anything, right?"
He always wondered how such a good thing could happen so easily to ordinary people.
Shen Xiaoxiao smiled and shook her head, then took her father's arm and reassured him: "No, but I guess after entering the base, you may need to assume corresponding responsibilities. These are not a problem."
Father Shen was finally relieved.
"Well, since you all have plans, let's do it as you young people do."
"But you never know when it will rain again. Even with a rubber boat it won't be safe. We should wait for the water to recede a bit before heading to the meeting point."
Shen Xiaoxiao nodded heavily, "Yes. I'll go cook with my mother first. Taking advantage of the unlimited water and electricity, we can cook all the edible things at home and put them in the space. This will keep them fresh and warm."
"Okay, I'll gather up all the valuables in the house and take anything I can find that's useful."
After the family members have made their assignments, they start to work on it.
Now that the rain has stopped, every household has started looking for tools to plug the gaps in windows and doors that are leaking rain.
What was even worse was the residents whose windows were scratched. The windows on the balcony were shattered and water leaked into the whole room. Most of the water had been scooped away, but the floor was still wet. They started busy sweeping, mopping the floor, and cleaning up the debris and broken glass.
Some people also hurriedly contacted the installation workers in a store near the community and urged them to come and install the windows.
But now the whole city has been hit by the disaster, and the windows of many houses are more or less damaged, so the workers are very busy and cannot take all the orders. Those who place orders late can only wait in line and pay a huge installation fee, which is almost two or three times the usual price.
In this situation, no one dares to bargain. After all, workers are in great demand now. If you are unwilling to pay, they will do the work for another company and pay a higher fee.
Those whose homes were flooded had no choice but to grit their teeth and pay a large sum of money to invite others in.
After all, the authorities have issued a warning, saying that heavy rain will continue for some time and the city will be severely flooded. Those who have the conditions can move to higher places.
Many people are trapped now. Even the rescue team has to rescue those in need first and send them to emergency shelters. They cannot take care of people in higher places yet.
To ensure safety, the entire city now needs to cut off water and electricity during specific time periods.
Residents can only take out various electronic products and power banks and charge them fully to avoid power outages and having no lighting at home.
I also searched for all kinds of water containers in the house, including basins, buckets, and various bottles and jars, and filled them with clean water.
It's just a phased power outage right now and the weather is starting to get colder, so there's no need to worry about the food in the refrigerator for now.
The rain only stopped for about three hours, and just as the water began to recede, it started raining again.
Shen Xiaoxiao opened the curtains and looked at the drizzling rain and the water that had submerged the car roofs and green trees. Some neighbors were wearing raincoats and sitting in small boats made of swimming rings and various mineral water bottles. They rowed to the shops to buy some supplies, looking very lonely on the turbid water.
The community groups and unit groups were also busy. Business-minded people took the opportunity to get goods from various channels and resell high-priced supplies, food, life jackets, swimming rings, batteries, emergency lighting, and even electric inflatable assault boats.
It had only been a day, and most people were just asking casually. Those who did buy something just wanted to eat some vegetables and fruits and buy some emergency lighting.
However, this time the rain lasted longer, lasting for five days.
It is already autumn and the weather is getting colder. We have to sleep under a blanket at night.
Water, electricity and natural gas are intermittent, so residents can only boil water and cook when they are available, and store tap water to charge their mobile phones.
After all, the only way to contact the outside world is through a mobile phone, and by looking at the rescue information released by the official, we can relieve anxiety and uneasiness.
But after five days of eating, those who had less food at home had almost finished what they could eat, and even those who were dealing with supplies had little food left.
So someone in the community group sent a message, saying that someone had extra food and wanted to buy it at a high price.
The man was a small leader in a company, lived in another building, and had a lot of money.
After a while, someone replied to him in the group: "How much did you pay for the food?"
"Will you sell me instant noodles for 200 yuan a bag? Dried noodles or dumplings are also fine. I'll buy any cooked food I can find. Money is not a problem."
As soon as this price was announced, many people were immediately attracted.
But some people still shamelessly said: "I have two bags of instant noodles here, selling them for 500 yuan."
The young leader immediately agreed: "Okay, I'll buy it."
Seeing this man so straightforward, some people began to be tempted. "How about snacks? I have potato chips and bread here. I'll sell them to you for 500 yuan."
"Okay, no problem. I'll transfer the money to you."
Although a few families with sufficient food bravely started selling things, most residents remained calm, worried about what to do if the heavy rain continued and they could not buy supplies.
After all, at this special moment, what can you do if you have the life to earn money but not the life to spend it?
These people are too greedy and are a very small minority in the community.
Some people couldn't stand this situation and said, "You are disrupting prices. I will report you."
The seller was very proud: "If you have money, you can buy it. It's a special period and food supply is tight. It's reasonable for me to sell my products at a higher price."
Someone even asked for medicine in the group: "My child is sick and has run out of fever-reducing medicine. Does anyone have more medicine? I'll pay for it."
With the example of selling high-priced food just now, someone immediately made a huge offer, "A box of antipyretic medicine is 500 yuan, do you want some?"
Seeing that others are making money, these people naturally are unwilling to sell things at low prices, and always feel that they are being taken advantage of.
But this time, someone finally couldn't stand this situation and said, "I have it at home, come and get it for free. This kind of phenomenon of taking advantage of the chaos to rip people off cannot be allowed to continue."
The mother who asked for medicine for her child expressed her gratitude repeatedly.
Some people in the group also praised this selfless behavior.
But most people in the group know that since someone has started it, it means that this phenomenon will not end because of the actions of one or two people.
If no more supplies are distributed, this community will really be in chaos.
(End of this chapter)
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