Chapter 2 — Floating Market Without Water

An placed the plastic ruler on the river bed, but the wind blew the paper with the coordinates flying out of his hand.

Ti ran after it and caught it before it fell into the mud. He used his knees to hold the paper, the camera dangling in front of his chest.

“Which pole are you measuring from?” Ti asked.

“From the dock side pile to the valve mouth.”

“Which pile is the real pile?”

An looked at three stakes protruding from the mud. The pile near the wharf is painted green, the second pile is covered with asphalt, and the third pile only has a piece of copper left. They are not in a straight line, but if joined, they form an angle towards the factory.

Khai leaned his pole into the mud. “Measure from the old shore, not from the new wharf.”

“Where is the old shore?”

He pointed to the row of olive trees behind the cultural house. Before the concrete embankment was built, the river bed used to be wider than it is now. The current wharf has encroached nearly ten meters. All tourist maps only draw the new shore.

“If we use the current map, the valve location is in the market channel,” An said.

“If we use the old map, it is on the water intake route of the pumping station.”

“Which pumping station?”

Khai did not speak. He walked along the edge of the mud, using a pole to visit each spot. Downstream, the pole hits a hard object, then sinks deeper. Khai marked with a plastic bottle. Ten minutes later, he found two more metal caps, smaller than the first.

“The pipeline branches,” he said.

An wrote it down in the book. “Where does the branch go?”

"One branch can go to the old filtration station. The other branch goes to the industrial park."

"Maybe?"

“I haven't opened it yet.”

Ms. Sau had someone stretch a rope around the valve area. She didn't want tourists to get into the mud, but she also didn't want to call the police before knowing what she was protecting. The floating market cooperative has an old regulation: any changes in the anchor channel must be notified to households. No one announced the water receding.

An arrived at the cooperative office at noon. The room is located on the second floor of the cultural house, below is the warehouse of life jackets and water tanks that the factory just sent. Ms. Sau opened the filing cabinet and took out the flow map.

The map is laminated, the year of creation is written in the left corner. A line of black ink runs from upstream, but in the middle of the page is another streak of ink covering it.

“This version has been edited,” An said.

“Who fixed it?”

“You don't know?”

Mrs. Sau closed the closet door. "You know this map has passed through many hands. When I joined the cooperative, the pipeline was no longer mentioned."

“But I know it does.”

"I know an old water line. Knowing whether it's still in use or not is another matter."

An looked at the seals in the corner of the map. There is a cooperative seal, a pumping station seal, and a factory seal. Latest factory stamp, stamped over the smeared text.

“Did the factory look at the map?”

"The factory sponsored the wharf repair. They have the right to see the records related to the channel."

“The right to view is not the right to edit.”

Mrs. Sau sat down. “What do you want to write?”

“I want to write an unusual sprint that exposes a pipeline that is not yet on the map.”

"Write like that, tomorrow people will pull each other down. Boats break, people fall, who will bear it?"

“If you don't write, who will bear it when the pipes are releasing something?”

Mrs. Sau looked at An for a long time. “Your mother still sells porridge at the wharf?”

"Still."

“Do you know how much this market depends on the factory?”

"Know."

"Knowing but still asking as if just by making it public, everyone would be free."

An did not reply. She understood that Mrs. Sau did not protect the factory because she liked it. She defends an agreement that has sustained the market through many seasons: factories support wharfs, cooperatives maintain channels, people don't ask too much about things that help water move on time.

Khai called from the dock. He said a copper measuring line had just appeared on the valve mouth. Above The line has traffic numbers, but the highest part is covered by mud. An ran down. Ti was there, he was holding a towel to wipe the stake.

“You cannot enter the wire area,” An reminded.

“I'm standing outside.”

“My feet are inside.”

Ti pulled his foot out. Under the sole of his sandal was a piece of black rubber that smelled of oil. Khai smelled it, then threw it into a nylon bag.

“Hydraulic oil,” he said.

“From valve?” An asked.

“Or from construction machines.”

Khai turned the broken crank. It didn't move, but a clicking sound echoed through the mud. The water around the valve cap turns brown.

An called the editorial office and sent photos without any conclusions. The editor replied that the photo was enough to make a short story, but needed more factory opinions.

Duy called right after that.

“I hear you're in the technical area,” he said.

“I'm in the public riverbed.”

"This valve belongs to an old drainage project. It is not related to the factory."

“Do you have the file?”

“Yes. I will send a notice.”

“What does the announcement say the pipeline is for?”

“Regulate the flow.”

“Where does the flow regulation come from?”

Duy was silent for a beat. “An, don't turn a flood-proof project into a pollution story.”

“I didn't say pollution.”

“But I'm shooting white foam.”

“The white foam is what I need to check.”

Duy hung up the phone.

As afternoon fell, the water in the muddy ditch receded further. A piece of iron pipe was exposed, with words written in silver paint on the wall:

“M-07 / DO NOT OPEN FREELY.”

Khai touched the words. “M-07 is the water intake door code.”

“From the factory?”

“Of the old pumping station.”

"You used to work there. Do you know this project?"

Khai stood up straight. “I know the code name.”

“Not a question.”

He looked at An, then turned towards the river. “I will tell tomorrow.”

I took another photo. In the photo, under the silver paint, there is an older inscription:

“Market water comes first.”

That night, the factory sent a statement saying the water level had decreased due to a local drought and denied any connection to the exposed pipes. The floating market received forty additional barrels of water support.

Ms. Sau posted a notice next to the boat anchor price list.

An looked at the two pieces of paper. One paper said water is the weather. The other said the price of a bottle of water was doubling.

In her phone, Khai sent a line:

“M-07 is not a water intake door. It is a water return door.”

An read that sentence over and over again. "Returning water" sounds more harmless than "discharging", but what a water return door can return to the river, at what time, and who is standing next to check, all remain unanswered. She texted Khai asking if he could meet her right away. Khai replied that he was at the old pumping station, but the station had been locked for many years.

An borrowed the newspaper's car and drove there. The pumping station is located behind a row of coconut trees, the iron door is covered with peeling green paint. On the wall there is a diagram that has been blurred by the rain. Khai stood on the side of the house, using an old key to open a small electrical box.

“Do you have permission to enter?” An asked.

"There are no more rights. Only the key remains."

“How different?”

"Rights come with responsibilities. Keys do not."

In the electrical box, the wires were cut, but a pressure gauge was still connected to the pipe. Khai wiped the glass. Kim stands at zero. He tapped lightly, the needle moved up and then fell down.

“The watch is broken,” An said.

“Or the pipe has no pressure.”

Khai opened the cover to check and saw a new piece of wire connected to the old recorder. Someone used the pumping station as a data collection point even though the project was listed as decommissioned.

“The factory gets the data here?” An asked.

"Don't know."

“You keep saying you don't know.”

“Because if I say guess, I will post it as truth.”

An did not object. She clearly noted: "Khai has not confirmed the source of the device." This sentence is longer than a title, but she needed it.

Ti called and said he had found the flow map on the school's computer. He asked her to read the serial number M-07. On the school map, the pipeline passes through the old wharf and ends at the factory area, but the lines are hidden by advertising paper. I used steam to remove the paper layer, revealing a downward arrow mark.

“Sister, there is the word M-17 here too.”

Khai heard it through the loudspeaker and immediately told Ti not to touch it any further. M-17 was the mud outlet in the old drawing, but on the school map it was just an unnamed square.

An asked Ti who posted the advertisement. He said the advertisement was from last year, when the school was renovating the computer room. The sponsor is the factory.

“So the map wasn't covered yesterday,” An said.

“But that doesn't mean they covered it because they knew about the pipeline,” Khai replied.

“It doesn't mean they don't know.”

On the way back to the station, An received a call from the editor. The news article about valves has been read by many people. He asked her if she was sure the project did not belong to the factory. An said no. He asked her to write more of the factory's response before posting the update.

Duy sent the announcement at nearly noon. The document says M-07 is an old item of the flood prevention program, currently not in operation; Any signs of foam and oil may be due to residential vehicles. An looked at the photo of the hose on the factory boat, but it wasn't enough to use.

Khai read the announcement. “They are partly right.”

“Which part?”

“M-07 belongs to the flood protection program.”

“What about the part that doesn't work?”

“If the valve is open, they can't say stop.”

“Would you say that?”

“I need to check the crank.”

The crank disappeared before they arrived. Khai led An to van point. New footprints piled on top of old mud, pulled toward the edge of the factory. A piece of measuring wire was cut, the end of the wire still had red paint on it.

“They cleared the scene,” An said.

Khai didn't say anything, just took a sample of the mud around the wire. He divided it into three bags, recording the location. Ti wanted to help, Khai gave him gloves.

“No touching with bare hands.”

"I know."

An's mother called to ask when the boat could sail. An said he didn't know. Mom said some small businesses had planned to rent a car to take their goods on the road, but the cost was triple. The fishmonger cannot do that.

An looked at the boats stuck in the mud. A technical phenomenon on paper is pushing people away from the only way they have done business.

In the afternoon, authorities placed temporary fences. The sign says "do not arbitrarily survey". An asked the neighborhood leader who was responsible for protecting the valve. He said he was waiting for assignment. Mrs. Sau took on the task of keeping the key, but was not allowed to open it.

Khai took An to his old boat. On the floor there is a copy of the operating shift list, but many names are abbreviated. Shift 2:17 has the letter "V".

“Vinh,” Khai said.

“Or someone else.”

“In the station there is only Vinh.”

“Vinh works for the factory?”

"After that."

An circled his name, then put a question mark next to it. She doesn't want this piece of paper to turn into a verdict.

At night, the rain fell lightly. The water in the trench around the pipe changes from brown to black. Khai called An to come and see. A temporary meter placed next to the pile was changing gears even though all pumps according to the factory had stopped.

An took the hands of the clock.

Khai said:

“M-07 is not a water intake door. It is a water return door.”

And somewhere upstream, a pump has just been started.