Chapter 70: Basement and Stride

06:30. Alarm clock. Silent. Lin Chen. Eyes open. Ceiling. Gray-white. Cracks. Unchanged. He turns onto his side. Left hand. Reaches beneath the quilt. Feels for. Left foot. Bandage. Dry. Edges. Slightly stiff. Pain. Dull. Not sharp. He sits up. Gets dressed. Movements. Slow. Weight. Shifted right. Feet to the floor. Stride. Thirty centimeters. Avoiding. The water stains. He washes up. Cold water. Face washed. Awake. In the mirror. Eyes. No bloodshot veins. Lips. Chapped. He applies lip balm. A thin layer. Leaves. Locks the door. Key. Into pocket. Metal. Cold.

07:00. Library. Basement. Iron door. Rust. Mottled. The teacher on duty. Standing. By the door. Holding a platform scale. Ledger. Ballpoint pen. Looks. At Lin Chen’s foot. “The injury. Not healed. Can you. Carry?” Lin Chen nods. “Yes. I can. Carry only. Not run.” The teacher hands him. Canvas gloves. “Old books. Journals. Textbooks. Counted by the jin. Thirty cents. Per jin. Damaged covers. Don’t count. Loose pages. Deduct. Half a jin. Work a full eight hours. Then settle up. You can rest. Twenty minutes. In the middle.” Lin Chen takes the gloves. Pulls them on tight. Knuckles. White.

07:15. Door opened. Light on. Dim yellow. Dust. Floating. Air. Stifling. Mildew mixed with. The sour smell. Of old paper. Lin Chen enters. Stride unchanged. Eyes sweeping. The stacks. Left side. Journals from the eighties. Right side. Textbooks from the nineties. The passage in the middle. Narrow. He crouches. Takes. From the very top. A stack of bound volumes. Radio. Heavy. Pressing down on his shoulder. He rises. Knees. Tremble slightly. Left foot touches down. Avoiding weight. Right leg. Bearing it steadily. Step. Thirty centimeters. To the scale. Puts down. The books. Scale beam. Lifts. The teacher shifts the weights. Calls out the number. “Twelve jin.” Lin Chen notes it. In his mental ledger. Three yuan six.

08:00. Second trip. Third trip. Sweat. Coming out. Undershirt. Wet. Stuck to his spine. Gloves. Rubbed through. Fingertips. Red. He stops. Changes. The glove lining. Cloth layer. Continues. Stride. Thirty centimeters. Breathing. Even. Not panting. Pain. Crawling up. From the ankle. To the calf. He grits his teeth. Does not stop. The stacks of books. Gradually lower. The scale numbers. Gradually rise. Eighteen jin. Twenty-four jin. Thirty-three jin. The ledger. Turns a page. Pen tip. Scratching paper. Rustle rustle.

09:15. Rest. Sitting. On the steps. Concrete. Cold. Through his trouser legs. He takes out. Two steamed buns. Cold. Hard. Eats them. With pickles. Chews slowly. Swallows dryly. Takes up. His water bottle. Sips. Moistens his throat. Spreads open. His notes. RF fundamentals. Transmission-line theory. Smith chart. Impedance matching. Formulas. Rewriting from memory. Pen tip. Fast. Unstopping. The page. Dense with words. Like ants. He reads through once. Closes the notebook. Shuts his eyes. In his mind. The chart reappears. Trajectories. Reflection coefficients. Normalized impedance. Point movement. Clear. No clutter.

09:40. Back to work. East-side stacks. Old textbooks. Curled covers. Brittle paper. He takes a pile. High-Frequency Electronic Circuits. Flips through. The table of contents. Familiar. Sets them on the scale. Number called out. “Nine jin.” He turns. Goes back. Takes books. Pressed under the bottom boxes. Hardback. Clothbound. Microwave Engineering. Principles of Measuring Instruments. Dust. Thick. He brushes it away. Titles revealed. Opens the pages. Yellowed. Diagrams. Clear. He pauses. Eyes falling. On the appendix. HP8591E. Spectrum analyzer. Calibration procedure. Front-end attenuation. Step settings. Internal attenuator switching logic. Compensation curve. He takes out. The small notebook he carries. Copies down. Key parameters. Page numbers. Movements light. Without stirring. The dust.

10:30. The teacher. Making rounds. Stops. Looks at the book. In Lin Chen’s hands. “This one. Should’ve been weeded out. From storage long ago. You want. To take it?” Lin Chen looks up. “Can I keep it?” The teacher nods. “Count it as loss. Won’t deduct from the weight.” Lin Chen puts the book away. Into his bag. Zipper closed. Heavy against his shoulder. Step. Thirty centimeters. Continues. Carrying. The scale totals. Jump. Forty-five jin. Fifty-eight jin. Sixty-seven jin. The ledger page. Filled. Turned. To a new page.

11:45. Final weighing. The last stack. Put on. The scale. Beam level. The teacher flicks the abacus beads. “Total. Eighty-seven jin. Thirty cents a jin. Twenty-six yuan one.” He opens the drawer. Counts out the money. Banknotes and coins. Mixed together. Hands it over. Lin Chen receives it. Cold. Heavy. Spreads it across. The desktop. Counts it carefully. Tens. Fives. Ones. Fifty-cent pieces. Dimes. Cents. Checks it again. Twenty-six yuan one. No discrepancy. He puts it away. Into the inner pocket. Against his chest. Warm.

12:30. Out of the basement. Through the door. The light. Dazzling. Sun. High. Shadows. Short. He walks. Thirty centimeters a step. Back to the dormitory. The corridor. Empty. Quiet. He pushes the door. Enters. Sets down his bag. Unloads his shoulder. Sits on the bed. Takes off his shoe. Unwraps the bandage. The wound. Dry. No seepage. Edges. Slightly red. Healing. He takes iodine. A cotton swab. Dabs lightly. Around it. Not touching. The center. Waits for it to dry. Wraps on. Fresh gauze. Secures it. Loose and tight. Just right. The stride. Still controllable.

13:15. Clears the desk. Spreads out. The ledger. Lists items.

One. Funds remaining. Twenty-six yuan one. Two. Train ticket. Eighteen yuan. Already prepared. Three. Shortfall. Filled. Four. Foot injury. Stable. Five. Attenuator. Sealed. Six. Theory review progress. Sixty percent. Seven. Practical equipment familiarity. Still needs work.

He pauses his pen. Calculates. Eight yuan one left. Enough for three days. Of dry food. And emergency medicine. He closes the ledger. Takes out. Principles of Measuring Instruments. Flips to. The appendix. Cross-checks it. Against the competition notice. HP8591E. Input attenuation. Must be set manually. In ten-decibel steps. He reads through. The procedure. Calibration. Signal source output. Known power. Fed into. The attenuator. Read on the spectrum analyzer. The difference. Is the actual loss. Record it. Correct it. He takes. Graph paper. Draws. The calibration block diagram. Signal source. Attenuator. Spectrum analyzer. Ground leads. Connected together. Operation. Inside a shielded box. To prevent interference. He marks. Key nodes. Warm-up. Fifteen minutes. Baseline noise test. Zeroing. Step switching. VSWR monitoring.

15:00. Corridor. Bulletin board. Newly posted. A sheet of paper. Additional scope. For the theory exam. VSWR measurement. Error analysis. Systematic error. Random error. Calibration residuals. He looks. For three seconds. Turns around. Goes back. To the dorm. Spreads paper. Derives. Error formulas. Reflection coefficient magnitude. Phase drift. Cable loss. Temperature drift. Connector repeatability. One by one. He lists. Corresponding. Avoidance methods. Preheating. Constant temperature. Fixed torque. Tightening connectors. With a torque wrench. Recording ambient temperature. He fills. Two pages. Ink marks. Drying through.

17:30. Canteen. Dinner. One steamed bun. One bowl of thin porridge. A little pickle. He sits. In the corner. Eats slowly. Looks at no one. Hears no voices. Only chewing. Swallowing. Calculating calories. Calculating time. Calculating stride. Calculating attenuation. Calculating error. Calculating margin. Four lines. Crossing. Without touching. Without tangling. Forward.

19:00. Back to the dorm. Light on. Desktop tidy. He takes. The attenuator in its insulated case. Puts it into. The inner compartment. Of the canvas bag. Multimeter. Into the side pocket. Graph paper. Report. Into the main compartment. Spare clothes. Steamed buns. Pickles. Packed separately. Zipper pulled. Tested. Smooth. Shoulder strap. Adjusted longer. Tries it on his back. Center of gravity. Steady. Stride. Thirty centimeters. Not stepping. In water stains. He looks out the window. Night. Deep. No stars. Wind. Stilled. Clouds. Scattered. Moonlight. Slanting across. The desktop. Dust. Floating faintly.

20:45. Under the crack. At the bottom of the door. Something slides in. White envelope. Thin. Postmark. Qingshi Village. Handwriting. Familiar. Wang Guiying. He crouches. Picks it up. Does not open it. Places it. On the corner of the desk. Beside the handbook. He knows. What it contains. Medicine expenses. Illness. Or perhaps only. News of safety. He is not in a hurry. He will open it. Tomorrow morning. Tonight. Only preparation. For the competition. He lies down. Closes his eyes. Breathing even. The pain in his left foot. Faint. Controllable. In his mind. No curves. No anxiety. Only parameters. Step values. Impedance matching. Error. Calibration. Margin. Four lines. In the dark. Crossing. Without collision. Without entanglement. Each moving forward.

22:15. Outside the window. Insects begin to chirp. Faint. Weak. He opens his eyes. Looks at the envelope. White. One corner. Slightly curled. He reaches out. Smooths it flat. Does not open it. Turns over. Closes his eyes. Sleeps.

Tomorrow morning. Seven o’clock. Final round. Of theory review. Eight-thirty. Open the letter. Nine o’clock. Laboratory. Calibrate. The attenuator. Eleven. Pack the bag. Afternoon. Familiarize the route. Sleep early. Next Wednesday. Departure. At six. Stride. Thirty centimeters. Not stepping. In water stains.

Forward.