This is a very important date.

It is when nearly every operating mechanical or computerized object became defective. These defects came in the forms of explosions, implosions, combustions, and - in most cases - just turning off. This happened in every nation except for mainland China. Other than a few problems in its territories of Taiwan and Korea, China continued to operate with the same frenzied buzz that it had for the last seventy-five years. Everywhere else, two centuries of innovation were obliterated in a moment.

None of this was an accident.

It began around 2015. That was the year when every piece of Chinese hardware – whether designed for computers, weapons or basic household items – was produced with a hidden microchip that blended with the rest of the item's components. Only a few people at each factory knew about this. Years after the process had begun, a group of British cyberpirates found a completely unnecessary piece of cybernetics in a Hong Kong-made computer game console that they were reverse-engineering. They told people what they’d found and there was some talk about it. But the talk moved from serious conversation into light-hearted joking, and then it devolved into the mocking condescension of anyone who thought there was anything relevant or important about this discovery. It was never brought up again.

The Chinese government was patient. It wasn’t enough that the chips be in nearly every new item that was produced. The chips had to be in every item in the world. Even when this totality had been achieved, they waited. This was too great of a plan to allow any doubt of the outcome. After all the work and patience, it would have been humiliating for one of China's military units to be taken down by a group of Californian farmers with shotguns.

When all of these goals had been met and surpassed, the five heads of the Communist Party met. They sat around a large round table, and, with supervillain solemnity, agreed to let it begin.

How each item broke down was determined by which year its chip had been made and in which item it had been inserted. Take automobiles as an example. Some older cars stalled on the expressways when their batteries died. Others had their steering mechanisms freeze up, which – in many cases – resulted in the car flipping over on the road. The newer cars exploded. In many cases, this happened while the driver was inside.

Jets crashed into the sea. Pacemakers became useless pieces of plastic. Streets became dark. But the biggest hit came when the televisions, phones and computers turned off. People had no idea what to do. There was a lot of rioting. There was a lot of looting. When peace came, it was brought in the form of the People’s Liberation Army marching into every major city in the world. China had the only aircrafts that could fly. They had the only vehicles that could move. They had the only boats that could navigate without a sail, and the only modern guns that could fire bullets.

Japan, the Pacific coast of America, and the whole of Australia were taken before most people even knew what was happening. India put up a bit of a fight, but they were bombarded into surrender. Russia worked out an alliance that was done so smoothly it left many wondering if it hadn’t already been negotiated. Europe, Israel, and America’s East Coast scrambled to stop the invasion. If they had just been given a few days to get their wits about them then they might have had a chance. But that was, of course, just what the Chinese had aimed to prevent.

So three million Chinese soldiers swept across the globe like a Biblical plague, and nobody could do anything to stop it.