The air in the basement was muddy, mixed with the smell of engine oil, the musty smell of dust cloth, and an extremely untimely, rich aroma of broth.
I stood in a row with a few men with blurred faces, like animals waiting to be selected. Our eyes were fixed on the man sitting in the folding chair. He’s the one giving the orders here, holding a crumpled stack of construction sheets-that’s the work of installing monitoring probes.
In that gloomy space, for some reason, this job has a fatal attraction for me. I clutched the screwdriver in my hand, my palm was full of sweat, and my heart seemed to be crawling with tens of thousands of ants, praying desperately:Choose me, please, give this job to me.
The man raised his eyelids and a cloudy glance swept over us. Eventually, he pointed his finger at the two men next to me.
“You two, go ahead and do it.” His voice was hoarse as if sandpaper was rubbing.
At that moment, a great sense of loss hit my chest like a lead. I watched the two companions excitedly take over the construction sheet, can’t wait to lift the ladder, carrying a roll of black coaxial cable to the depths of the corridor. They began to climb, punch holes, and wire, every movement was dazzling in my eyes. I stood in a dark corner, my teeth biting my lips, and my heart was filled with intense jealousy.
I wanted to do that job so much that the desire even made me feel a little dizzy.
Just then, my attention was forced by a “gurgling” sound of boiling water.
The man who sent the job did not know when he set up a simple induction cooker at his feet with a small stainless steel pot on it. The milky white soup base was tumbling violently, and he was using a pair of long chopsticks to cut pieces of extremely thin, crystal clear fish into the pot.
As soon as the fillets come into contact with boiling water, they curl up and turn an attractive snowy white. The sweet smell was almost burrowing into my bones. I couldn’t help but swallow a big gullet, and the previous jealousy was instantly replaced by a more primitive and savage hunger. I want to eat that pan of fillet, thinking crazy. I stared at the man’s chopsticks, and my sight was almost stuck to those white-flowered pieces of meat.
The man seemed to be aware of my eyes. He turned his head and grinned at me, revealing an extremely strange and sticky smile.
Then I blinked my eyes.
That is, in the blink of an eye, the smell, the temperature, the light, everything changes.
The strong smell of fish soup disappeared, replaced by the unique, dry and static air-conditioning smell in the computer room. The darkness of the basement disappeared, replaced by the dark blue light emitted by dozens of LCD screens.
I looked down at my hand and the screwdriver was gone. I was wearing a dark blue uniform and holding a black rocker in my hand. I don’t know what kind of time and space folding, I didn’t get the job of installing monitoring, but inexplicably became a night shift attendant in the monitoring room.
I quickly accepted this setting and looked up at the huge surveillance TV wall in front of me.
On the screen is the dead night of this building. Corridors, stairwells, basements… Countless black-and-white or secluded green images flicker silently.
I used to manipulate the rocker and cut the lens to the basement screen.
There is some snowflake noise in the picture, but I can still clearly see the place where I was standing a few hours ago. The induction cooker is still there, and the water in the pot is still boiling. The pie man was still sitting in the folding chair, munching on the “fillets” that had just been scalded “.
There was a sudden churn in my stomach as I finally saw some detail in the corner of the screen.
Two familiar engineering caps were scattered on the ground, along with several discarded pliers and screwdrivers. It was the tool of the two chosen companions. The plastic basin at the man’s feet is not a fishbone at all, but a stump with dark red blood.
The two companions were not pretending to be monitored. In other words, after the monitoring is finished, they become the ingredients in the pot.
The man ate his mouth full of oil on the screen, picked up a piece of white meat as thin as cicada wings and put it into his mouth. He seemed to know that I was looking at him. Suddenly, he stopped his chopsticks and slowly raised his head. His turbid eyes were directly aimed at the monitoring probe-that is, me outside the screen.
He showed that strange smile again and said a word to me with his mouth.
Cold sweat soaked my uniform in an instant. I read his mouth:
“Unfortunately, today did not choose you.”
