«What's so surprising about it?» Xu Mei asked. «Do I look younger?»

Longwei looked at the girl's eyes carefully, secretly enjoying her wounded expression. At that moment, she looked right like a kid. Finally, he decided to lie: «not at all!»

Her face didn't change much, but he was sure she was a bit angry at him. He chuckled and drunk some tea to hide behind the cup.

«Did you get involved with the Insurgents again?» Wang Meng asked out of the blue, visibly annoyed.

Longwei choked and coughed for a while, but the other two didn't seem to notice him.

«No, not again,» she answered, and Wang Meng sighed relieved. «I never stopped being involved.»

«Are you mad?»

«Yes, quite mad. However, is it alright to mention it in front of your boss?»

«Isn't you being here related to your extra-curricular activities?»

This time was Xu Mei that choked.

«How do you know? Did you guess?»

«You are covered in bruises, either Senator Lin found you wounded or he caused those wounds himself.»

«Yeah, but causes may have nothing to do with the Insurgents.»

«Sure,» Wang Meng finished and shifted his attention to the food.

«You would know everything about it if you didn't betray me back then,» she whispered angrily.

Years had passed since their high school days, but they both remembered what happened and the promise they made to each other after. Xu Mei was sure Wang Meng was working for Lin Longwei in part to fulfil that same promise.

The silence ruled for some minutes until Longwei broke it.

«Wang Meng, we were talking about hiring an analyst for our further work. I think we can give it a try. Shortlist some candidates and send me their information.»

«Yes, Senator Lin.»

«Do you have any suggestion right now?»

«Of course.»

«Let's hear.»

«You already have one here. In front of me.»

«Xu Mei?» he asked, surprised. «You are studying maths, right?»

She nodded.

«What are you specialising in?»

«Statistic.»

He turned to Wang Meng once again: «didn't you say your candidate was majoring in AI techniques and machine learning?»

Xu Mei frowned and murmured: «It's the same stuff.»

«I didn't know.»

«Now you know,» she said, this time more relaxed.

«How could artificial intelligence help us, exactly?» Lin Longwei then asked.

«Well, it depends on what you need. For example, you can cluster the people that vote and then analyse the data to find out how to convince a certain category to trust you. You can simulate the market and forecast how your product will sell. You can use statistic tools to play games where you don't have all the information, like most card games, or when the possible situations are too much, like chess.»

When Xu Mei finished with her explanation, she waited for questions with her head slightly tilted to the left.

Lin Longwei was listening with attention and nodded to her. «So, you can predict the future?»

«If I have enough data, I can guess anything, even in the past. You use statistic to estimate information you don't have. Like the population, that tends to grow with some known rules. You can estimate how many people lived in this city the year that the census couldn't be performed.»

«I understand.»

The girl lifted her eyebrows, unsure whether Lin Longwei really understood or just wanted to change the topic.

«The point is that you identify the state or behaviour of a large number of individuals. So, if I am correct, you can say whether a law will be approved but not who exactly will vote for it or against it.»

«Yes, that's correct. In general, I cannot foresee individual behaviour, but there are some exceptions. You can use statistics to identify outliers, that is to say, people with really unusual behaviour. This way, you can reduce online swindles or find people with rare talents.»

«Is it really possible?»

«It has been done a lot of times already, but nothing is a hundred per cent certain. The smaller the number of data, the less the precision.»

«Makes sense,» he said, holding his chin with his left hand. During the conversation, his gaze didn't move from her, not even for half a second.

«It doesn't just make sense. It works,» Xu Mei pointed out.

She was sure the man didn't grasp all that she's said, and she didn't make any effort to make herself understood.

She had used to explain her thoughts with more precision in the past until she had found out that her audience was usually not interested in what she was saying. The only exceptions were her classmates, but they didn't need too much explaining to understand her.

She was sure Lin Longwei would give up as well.

They had finished dinner, and Xu Mei was drinking tea, while Lin Longwei was smoking a cigarette. Wang Meng was reading something on his phone lost in his thoughts, not paying attention to the two of them.

«And how do you know that you have enough data?»

«Depends on the problem.»

«Let's say clustering. How do you know that the data you have contain the cause of the discrimination?»

Xu Mei raised her bows, surprised.

They continued their discussion in the studio, where she could use some paper and a pencil to better explain her thoughts.

Wang Meng continued to work by himself, interrupting them from time to time to talk with Lin Longwei.

When Lin Longwei noticed that Xu Mei was tired, he decided to end their gathering. He accompanied her to her room and wished a good night before coming back to the office to finish his actual work.

It was nearly dawn when he poured himself a glass of brandy, lit a cigarette and went to the terrace to relax.