The design department of the machinery factory is brightly lit at this moment.
The design department staff were arguing incessantly around a drawing on the table.
More people continued to arrive at the design department.
Lin's father sat to the side, holding a cup of tea, watching everyone argue until their faces were red and their necks were thick, and smiled faintly without saying a word.
The older comrades who arrived later, seeing Lin's father's calm and composed demeanor, couldn't help but lean over and say, "Hey, Lin, looking at you with that sly, gloating expression, which of your men overcame the difficulty?"
Mr. Lin skimmed the tea foam off his teacup with the lid, then asked in suspense, "Guess?"
The older comrade scratched his head: "Do you even need to guess? Is it your chosen successor, Comrade Lu? After all, he's a top student from H University. This hurdle has stumped us for months. Young people are so smart!"
Lin's father smiled and said, "Guess again."
The old man looked at Lin's father suspiciously, thought for a moment, and nudged him with his elbow: "Could it be your son? Lin Feng is quite talented, and he's been learning from you for so many years. He's no worse than Xiao Lu! Not bad, Old Lin, you two have a family tradition of talent, like father, like son! You're not secretly giving your son special lessons, are you?"
Lin's father shoved him away: "Get out, get out! You can't expect anything good to come out of a dog's mouth! Let me be frank with you, the people who discovered the problems and overcame the difficulties are not from our machinery factory!"
Not only did the elderly comrade next to him hear this, but those nearby also heard it.
First, his face fell: "Not one of ours? Or is he some outside help you hired?"
"Could it be from a sister unit? We'd be so embarrassed! We made a solemn pledge to get the task back, and now we can't even do it ourselves, so we have to ask someone else for help. If word gets out, we people from the machine factory will be ashamed of ourselves from now on!"
The leaders of the machinery factory who had just entered all frowned upon hearing this.
Especially Lu's father, who frowned as he looked at Lu Kai, who was surrounded by blueprints, and saw that he was frowning and had a bad look on his face, his heart skipped a beat.
He quickly stepped forward, blocking the others' view of Lu Kai.
Factory director Wu Jie scanned the room. "Old Lin, what exactly happened?"
Lin's father then stood up: "Old Wu, do you remember what I told you a few days ago?"
Wu Jie understood in a flash and exclaimed, "It was him?"
Mr. Lin nodded: "I told you back then that he was a rare talent! I suggested that we make an exception and hire him into our factory, but you disagreed and hesitated! Now we're relying on him to solve this problem! How can you just use his drawings for free?"
Wu Jie never imagined that the person recommended by Lin's father would be so capable.
However, as the head of a factory, he naturally had to consider more factors, unlike Lin's father who was straightforward and only considered technical issues.
Those nearby, having only heard half of it, were still confused and couldn't help but ask, "Director Wu, what exactly is going on? If you have such talent, why don't you recruit him into our factory? If you had recruited him sooner, wouldn't we have solved the problem sooner? Why does the whole factory have to be so anxious?"
Some with ulterior motives started whispering, "Old Wu, you're not doing this right! You should prioritize the bigger picture and not let personal matters ruin important matters for our factory—"
Someone chimed in, "Exactly! No matter the reason, not hiring someone like that is irresponsible to the factory!"
Wu Jie looked around and saw many doubtful and disapproving glances, which made him laugh in exasperation: "Fine, you're all right! Tomorrow I'll hire the person and say that you all agreed to it! Anyway, the only problem is their class background—"
Upon hearing this, everyone's expression changed.
The people who had just spoken immediately looked back awkwardly, shifting the blame to Lin's father: "Old Lin, this is where you're wrong! How can we hire someone with questionable class background into our factory? Isn't this ruining our unity?"
"Yes, yes, yes! Old Wu, you're so principled! We all misunderstood you!"
...
Wu Jie and Lin's father both chuckled, and everyone looked embarrassed and fell silent.
It was Mr. Lu who stepped in to smooth things over: "Let's talk about these things later. First, let's discuss the design drawings! Have you confirmed that the difficult problems have been overcome? Will there be any problems later?"
Lin's father took a sip of tea and said coldly, "What, Deputy Factory Director Lu doesn't believe me?"
Mr. Lu smiled and said, "Old Lin, I know you're angry that I questioned your professionalism! But this is a major matter concerning the future development of our factory, so we have to be careful, right? Besides, you said that the design drawings weren't even drawn by you, but by an outsider with questionable political background!"
"The more critical the moment, the more cautious we must be! We can't afford to lose our composure first!"
Mr. Lin glanced at Mr. Lu, said nothing more, and then said to the factory manager Wu Jie, "Old Wu! Whether there are any problems with these blueprints, and whether the difficulties have been overcome, we'll know once we make the model according to these blueprints, won't we?"
Wu Jie exchanged a glance with Lin's father and nodded in agreement: "Old Lin is right, let's make the model first."
The others, wanting to see what was going on, all nodded.
Lu Kai and the design department staff took the blueprints to the workshop.
Only Wu Jie and Lin's father remained in the design department office. Lin's father tossed Wu Jie a cigarette and asked, "If the model turns out fine, what are you going to do?"
Wu Jie took the cigarette, lit it, and took a puff. A look of worry appeared between his brows. "You're just giving me a hard time, aren't you? If there really isn't a problem, it would be such a waste not to use this talent! But you know about his background! If we don't handle it properly, not only will we be unable to protect him, but we'll also cause him trouble!"
Lin's father leaned closer, "Don't you have a comrade-in-arms in Beijing? Why don't you ask him to help you inquire? I think that at Xiao Gu's age, he's probably being dragged down by his family or superiors. If we can make a quick buck, we should give it a try!"
"Putting everything else aside, just look at his abilities. If it weren't for his class background, would he have ended up in our factory? He would have been snatched up by another company long ago. Don't you think that makes sense?"
"I think Lu Kai and the others still need some experience with the next few designs! Our design department only has a few old guys, and I doubt they can handle it all! Especially that task. We made a solemn pledge when we did it, but now that I think about it, if those bastards from other factories hadn't been so helpless, it wouldn't have fallen into our hands!"
"It's a small matter if we lose face, but it's a big deal if we fail to complete the mission!"
Hearing this, Wu Jie took a deep drag on his cigarette, which burned his fingers, making him flinch. He threw the cigarette butt on the ground, ground it under his foot, and made up his mind: "You're right! I'll call my comrades over there!"
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