The stage lights slowly dimmed, leaving only a spotlight shining on the center of the stage. He, no, it, gracefully bent over, making a perfect curtain call pose. The applause of the entire audience was thunderous and long-lasting.
“Perfect!” In the control room, the project leader, Lao Wang, excitedly slapped the table, his face beaming with pride. “This is the most successful performance of our ‘Transcend’ series! ‘AI Dance King’, indeed!”
The stage lights went out, and backstage was a mess. Props lay scattered everywhere, staff were busy cleaning up, and the air was filled with various instructions and complaints. In a corner, however, a robot numbered "Spring Festival Gala 037" was meticulously conducting a self-check. Its body was silver, and faint red lights flickered at its joints, like a warrior who had just finished a battle.
"037, you performed well today, successfully stealing the show." A middle-aged man in work clothes walked over and patted the robot's metal shell, his tone laced with tired relief. He was Lao Wang, the technician responsible for maintaining the robots, and also 037's only "friend."
Old Wang was laid off, or rather, "optimized." He walked in the winter wind, carrying a cardboard box printed with the company logo, like a leek uprooted from the soil.
Old Li had been working at the Shenzhen Metro for fifteen years. He couldn't remember how many spring couplets he had put up, but this year was definitely the most unusual. In previous years, they were all red with gold characters, festive and joyous. This year, however, a batch of white couplets with black characters had appeared out of nowhere, plastered all over every corner of the station, even the ticket machines were covered with a sheet saying "Have a smooth journey and arrive home safely."
"Who did this?" Old Li complained to the new intern, Xiao Zhang. Xiao Zhang pushed up his glasses and said carefully, "Uncle Li, I heard this is what was requested from above, to reflect...to reflect a new kind of cultural creativity?"
Old Wang hasn't been quite himself lately. He no longer complains about the office coffee machine always being broken, nor does he secretly play games during his lunch break. He spends his days holding a strange device, tapping it repeatedly, making a "dong dong dong" sound, like some primitive rhythm. His colleagues were initially curious, but later got used to it, assuming Old Wang was up to some new trick.
Zhang Qiang was a standard office worker. He got up at seven o'clock every morning, squeezed into the subway, clocked in, and started his repetitive and tedious day. His life was like the black down jacket he had worn for three years: ordinary, practical, but unremarkable.