Phosphorescent Stardust

Chapter 2: The Price of a Smile

The next day, the Eye of Efficiency paid its visit earlier than usual.

Tal stared at the floating window, a throb starting in her temples. "Warning: User 'Tal Si'en' has failed to meet baseline for morning work efficiency. A moderate caffeine intake and posture adjustment are recommended to improve energy circulation efficiency."

She rubbed her swollen eyes. Last night's cold noodles still sat in her stomach like a congealed lump of phosphor dust. Her terminal pinged again. This time, it was a promotional alert from Stardust Express: "10 credits off for all new users! Refer a friend and get 5 bonus credits!"

A classic piece of black humor. Everyone in this city was desperate to kick someone else into the same mire they were drowning in, all for a pathetic handful of bonus credits. Tal swiped the notification away with a bitter smile, but the gnawing emptiness in her gut forced her to tap the gaudy app icon once more.

The interface for "Eternally Satisfied" popped up, the algorithm helpfully suggesting yesterday's Groowlbeast Bolognese. Tal's finger hovered for a moment before she typed a new message in the notes section: "A plea for a shred of genuine human decency. No plastic smiles, no hollow greetings. If it’s Mr. Ryde Winde delivering, just tell him he can leave it at the door. I know the fines for illegal parking are steep."

After sending the order, Tal felt a ridiculous flicker of pride in her minor act of rebellion, immediately followed by a wave of anxiety. Would a note like that get her flagged by the algorithm as a "special request user"? Would it delay her order?

Thirty-two minutes later, the chime rang. Tal refreshed the app; the courier was, indeed, Ryde Winde. She jogged to the door and opened it after a quick check through the peephole.

Ryde stood there, his breathing more even than the day before. As he handed her the meal bag, Tal noticed a small, silver device attached to the jawline of his helmet, pulsing with a faint, rhythmic blue light.

"It's you," Tal said, accepting the bag. She was surprised to find the packaging was exceptionally neat today, with the complimentary utensil packet taped tidily to the side.

Ryde nodded, pointing to a new QR code sticker on the bag. "New platform regulation. Scanning this to rate me adds points to my 'Sincere Service' score." His voice was as level as ever, but Tal detected a deep-seated weariness beneath it.

Curious, she scanned the code. The page that loaded displayed an infuriatingly complex rating system: Punctuality, Packaging Integrity, Service Enthusiasm, Smile Sincerity... Each category had sub-metrics, a dense list of over twenty different criteria.

"What is this..." Tal looked up and noticed the silver device on Ryde's helmet suddenly flash a soft green.

"Smile Recognizer," Ryde said, his tone as flat as if he were describing the weather. "The platform's newest mandatory upgrade. It requires us to maintain a 'moderate smile' during deliveries, graded in real-time by an AI. A smile-rate below eighty percent gets you a five-credit deduction. Below sixty, it's ten credits. No smile for the whole trip? They dock half a day's earnings."

Tal's mouth fell open, unsure how to respond. Just then, the device under Ryde's helmet flickered again, this time a glaring red.

"Apologies," Ryde said, suddenly stretching his lips into a standardized smile, the curve of his mouth so precise it was unnerving. "Facial muscle relaxation detected. Immediate adjustment required. Enjoy your meal."

The smile was as stiff as if it had been cast from a mold, a grotesque contrast to the exhaustion in his deep violet eyes.

"That's absurd..." Tal murmured.

"This is worse," Ryde said, gesturing to a new badge pinned to his chest. "'Emotional Stability Monitor,' beta version. It tracks heart rate, galvanic skin response, and hormone levels to determine if I'm in an 'Optimal Service State.' Fall out of that state, and you get demoted in the order queue."

Only then did Tal notice the small, inconspicuous device pinned to his collar, emitting a faint, regular vibration.

"The platform says it's to 'optimize the service experience,'" Ryde said, his forced smile gone, a hint of sarcasm in his voice. "In reality, it's to squeeze every last drop of emotional value out of every single person."

At that moment, a shrill alarm blared from Tal's personal terminal. She looked down. It was a notification from her company's AI management system: "Employee Tal Si'en has been detected stationary at her workstation for an excessive period. A brief period of activity is recommended to improve circulatory efficiency. A team stand-up meeting has been automatically scheduled for you in two minutes."

Tal couldn't stop a curse from escaping her lips. Ryde seemed used to such things, merely giving a slight nod. "You're busy. Don't forget to scan the rating."

Back at her desk, mechanically participating in the impromptu virtual stand-up, Tal opened her meal. The noodles, miraculously, weren't congealed. The sauce was packed neatly in a separate container. On the lid was a handwritten note, the script messy but firm: "Chef was in a foul mood today, went heavy on the salt. Make do. – Old Man Wang"

Tal couldn't help but laugh. It was the first genuine human connection she'd felt in weeks, even if it was just a grumbled kindness from a stranger in a kitchen.

The afternoon was even more grueling. The company had rolled out a new "Creativity Assessment System," which scored employees by monitoring their eye movements, keystroke frequency, and even facial micro-expressions. Tal was forced to periodically adopt poses of "deep thought" or "sudden inspiration" while coding, lest the system flag her for "lacking innovative thinking."

Before the end of the day, her supervisor called an all-hands meeting to announce that, due to the increased efficiency of AI programming assistants, the team size needed to be "optimized and streamlined." While Tal kept her job, her salary was cut by 15%, while her workload was increased by 50%. Her supervisor called it "the inevitable tide of the industry" and said that "only by embracing change can we avoid being left behind."

Dragging her exhausted body back to her apartment, Tal opened the Stardust Express app. She found a new system notification on Ryde's rating page: "Courier Ryde Winde has been detected with a 92% Smile Recognition pass rate and compliant emotional stability for the day. He has been upgraded to 'Preferred Service Provider.' Delivery fee rate increased by 0.5 credits/order."

Tal stared at the notification, a wave of nausea washing over her. She thought of Ryde's deep violet eyes, the standardized smile he was forced to wear, the tiny device monitoring his very soul.

In this system, everyone was being quantified, rated, optimized. Human emotion and dignity had a price tag, converted into data points in an algorithm.

Tal gave Ryde's page five stars. In the comment box, she wrote: "The courier suggested I meet him downstairs to save him time. This is a reasonable request, and we should all cooperate." Before hitting send, she hesitated, then added another line: "I hope one day a real smile won't need to be recognized by a machine."

After submitting the review, she received an instant reply from Ryde—a new feature, the "Courier-User Instant Messenger," where each message cost 0.1 credits to send.

"Thanks. But real smiles? They’ve been marked up to a price we can’t afford."

Tal stared at the sentence for a long time, unmoving. Outside her window, Phosphor City glittered with its cold, indifferent light, a colossal machine silently grinding away the last vestiges of humanity.