The Department‘s Attention

Doctor Xiao first realized something was wrong on an ordinary Tuesday afternoon. He had just finished a not-too-complicated surgery and was taking off his sweat-stained mask when the head nurse handed him an unsigned grey envelope. The envelope's texture was unusually stiff, its edges sharp enough to seemingly cut a finger. "Someone left it at the front desk, said it was for you, must be opened personally." The head nurse's voice carried an unusual note of caution.

Inside the envelope was only a thin slip of paper, printed with a few lines in a standard Song typeface: "Doctor Xiao: In view of certain recent situations and related public feedback, 'the Department' has decided to conduct a necessary inquiry with you. Please report to Room 1704, 17th Floor, Block B, Municipal Building tomorrow morning at nine o'clock sharp, bringing your identification and professional qualification certificate. Punctuality is mandatory. The Department."

No specific reason, no mention of any incident. "Certain situations," "related public feedback"—these phrases floated like oil slicks on water, vague yet unsettling. "The Department"? Which department? He had practiced medicine for over a decade and had never heard of such a designation. It sounded so vast, all-encompassing, yet pointed to nothing specific.

Doctor Xiao tried to probe the head nurse for more information, but she just shook her head, avoiding his gaze. "I don't know anything. The person just dropped off the letter and left, wearing an ill-fitting grey uniform."

The next day, Doctor Xiao arrived at Block B of the Municipal Building with a sense of inexplicable apprehension. The building itself exuded a repressive atmosphere. Cold marble floors reflected a pallid light, the corridors were empty, and only his footsteps echoed monotonously. The 17th floor was even more terrifyingly silent, as if the air had been sucked out. The door to Room 1704 was frosted glass, obscuring the view inside, and bore no markings.

He knocked gently. The door slid open silently a crack. An expressionless man, also in a grey uniform, gestured for him to enter. The room's interior was completely different from what he had imagined—neither an interrogation room nor an office, but more like a long-abandoned warehouse. In the center stood a solitary metal table and two chairs. The walls were mottled, and indistinct junk was piled in the corners. The air was thick with the smell of dust and old paper.

"Sit." The man in grey pointed to one of the chairs, sat in the other himself, and took out a thick stack of forms from a matching grey briefcase.

"Excuse me, is this... 'the Department'?" Doctor Xiao asked cautiously.

"This is Room 1704." The man didn't look up, starting to leaf through the forms. "Name?"

"Xiao..."

"We know." The man cut him off, pointing to a field on the form. "We want to hear you say it yourself."

For the next hour, Doctor Xiao felt trapped in an absurd dream. The questions the man asked were utterly trivial, often completely unrelated to his profession. He was asked about his favorite color as a child, what he usually ate for breakfast, the quality of his sleep last night, his opinion on the crooked tree outside the window. With each question, the man meticulously checked boxes or wrote something on the forms, as if this information were crucial for some momentous judgment.

When Doctor Xiao tried to ask the reason for the investigation, the man simply repeated: "This is a necessary inquiry procedure. Please answer truthfully." He felt like a dismantled component, every irrelevant detail meticulously examined and filed away, while the core question—why he was here at all—remained untouched.

"About the 'public feedback'..." Doctor Xiao couldn't help but press again, "What does that refer to specifically? Was a patient dissatisfied? Or..."

The man finally looked up, his eyes behind the glasses emotionless. "Public feedback is a holistic perception, Doctor Xiao. It's not a specific voice, but rather a... tendency diffused in the air. The Department is responsible for capturing and responding to this tendency."

"Tendency?" A chill ran down Doctor Xiao's spine. "A tendency towards what?"

The man didn't answer, merely lowered his head and continued writing on the forms, the scratching sound like some unknown insect gnawing at the silence.

When the inquiry ended, the man offered no conclusion, only telling him: "We will inform you of the next step. In the meantime, please keep your communication channels open and be prepared to cooperate with the Department's follow-up work at any time."

Doctor Xiao walked out of the Municipal Building in a daze. The sunlight was harsh, yet he felt enveloped in a layer of invisible dust. Back at the hospital, he found that everything seemed different. His colleagues' gazes became complicated, tinged with scrutiny and an indefinable distance. Walking down the ward corridor, he felt that the patients in their beds, even the walls themselves, were silently scrutinizing him. He began to meticulously review his recent work—every detail, every diagnosis, every patient interaction—trying to pinpoint the "situation" that might have triggered the "public feedback." But he found nothing. His memory became a chaotic swamp where any minor flaw was infinitely magnified, twisted into potential evidence of guilt.

A few days later, he received another notice from 'the Department,' this time requiring him to submit a detailed report on his personal life, including but not limited to records of social activities over the past three months, an analysis of his personal spending habits, and his views on current social hot topics. He felt the absurdity but dared not refuse. Like a prisoner forced to dissect his own soul, he wrote down those meaningless details word by word under the lamp late at night, feeling himself gradually dissolving, disappearing.

'The Department's' inquiries became more frequent, the locations increasingly random. Sometimes in a vacant hospital storage room, sometimes at an abandoned bus stop on the city outskirts, once even in the corner of a bustling fast-food restaurant. Each time, it was a different man in a grey uniform asking the same trivial yet unsettling questions. He felt enveloped by an invisible net, woven from countless tiny, irrelevant threads, yet incredibly strong, impossible to break free from.

He began to suffer from insomnia, loss of appetite, and his hands would tremble uncontrollably during surgery. He even started to wonder if the so-called 'public feedback' actually existed, or if it was merely a phantom conjured by 'the Department' to judge everyone it targeted. He felt like a beetle trapped in a glass jar, people outside watching his struggles with detached interest, while all he could do was crawl futilely, bumping against the transparent, hard barrier.

One evening, dragging his exhausted body home, he found a new notice taped to his door. Not from 'the Department,' but from hospital administration. The notice informed him that, in view of his recent 'state' and 'certain external feedback,' it was recommended he take temporary leave to rest and recuperate. Looking at the flimsy piece of paper, he suddenly understood something. No verdict, no conviction, not even a clear accusation. 'The Department' had simply infiltrated his life silently, changed the atmosphere around him, and then, he was naturally pushed out.

He stood at the door of his empty home, the city lights blurring into indistinct patches in his eyes. He didn't know what he had done wrong, nor whether 'the Department's' investigation was over, or if this was just another beginning. He only felt a bone-deep exhaustion and coldness, as if he had been forgotten by the world in some unknown corner, while the omnipresent 'Department,' and the 'public feedback' it represented, still loomed like a huge shadow over every moment of his future. He looked up at the night sky; there were neither stars nor answers there.