Chapter 5 — Floating Market Without Water

Ti took out the camera battery and inserted it into Mr. Nam's old reader.

Your camera's memory is full. Since his father's death, Ti has used it to photograph everything his mother said was "not worth photographing": oil stains on the water, cracks in the embankment, boats carrying sacks passing by at dawn. He doesn't understand all the images, but knows change often starts with something adults don't want to see.

Photos appear one by one. An sat next to him, numbering the time. I name the file with date, time and location. There were photos he took with the wrong finger, there were photos filled with mud, but the series of photos from 2:11 a.m. to 2:23 a.m. made An stop breathing.

In the first photo, the southern river surface still has a narrow strip of water.

Second photo, the water strip expands.

In the third photo, white foam appears next to pile M-07.

Fourth photo, a small boat passing by. There were two people on the boat, one holding a red light.

In the fifth photo, the water recedes from the market channel.

“Where do you stand?” An asked.

"On the roof of the warehouse. Mom told me to get up and avoid the forklift."

“Why did you take the photo on time?”

“Self-recording machine.”

Khai leaned closer to the screen. “The red light is the valve check light.”

“Are you sure?”

“The check light has a red filter and does not illuminate widely.”

An ejection of the fourth image. The person holding the lamp has his back turned, the other person has a short figure and square shoulders. On the side of the boat is a gray plastic barrel, the type used in pumping stations.

“Look at this,” Ti said.

He pointed to the corner of the photo. A flexible hose connects from the boat to the water. The pipe end is located exactly above the M-07 pipe branch.

An sent photos to the editor. The editor called back immediately:

"The picture is good. But there is no proof that the boat belongs to the factory."

"I know."

“Don't use affirmative headlines.”

“I will write the water discharge phenomenon by the hour.”

“Are there people in the photo?”

"Have."

“Ask for their permission before posting.”

An looked at Ti. “Do you want the picture posted?”

Ti did not answer immediately. He asked his mother if her face was seen. An enlarged image; Ti's mother is just a small shadow on the wharf.

“Can't recognize it.”

“Then post.”

Khai does not agree. He said the photos prove when the valve opened, but do not prove who operated it. If you post it too early, the factory will say the photo was cropped, and people will point fingers at each other.

“What are you more afraid of?” An asked.

“I'm afraid he's right.”

"Why?"

Khai looked at the fourth photo. “Because I know the time is 2:17. I used to schedule discharge.”

An turned off the screen.

“Did you sign the acceptance record?”

“Not now.”

“I'm asking for old records.”

Khai rubbed his face with his hand. Mr. Nam placed the drawing roll on the table, but did not open it yet.

“Khai, if you signed, say it before someone else finds it,” Mr. Nam said.

Khai stood up and went to the wharf. An followed. On the riverbed, boats stuck in mud lay motionless like fish left on the shore.

“That year the factory did not have its own water return system,” Khai said. "The old pumping station regulates the whole area. If you want to maintain the water level for the market, you must open M-07 according to schedule. If you want to lower the level to clean the tank, you must also open M-07."

“Who makes the schedule?”

“Pumping station.”

“Who signed the acceptance?”

“Me and the station chief.”

“Does the outlet send sludge?”

“By design, only filtered water.”

“What about reality?”

Khai looked at the mud under his feet. “I haven't checked yet.”

“You signed without checking?”

"The altitude recorded on paper is higher than reality. If recorded correctly, the system is not safe enough to operate."

An heard Ti's camera click behind him.

“You can't take pictures of people when they're talking in private,” Khai said.

Ti hung up the phone. “I took mud.”

Khai didn't know whether to be angry or not laugh.

Mrs. Sau called everyone to a meeting. Duy sent a request to the factory to have exclusive rights to inspect the valve area because "this is a device at risk". Ms. Sau said that if she refused, the factory would withdraw the boat support program.

A boat owner asked: "How much support?"

“Wharf painting, life jackets, dredging fees.”

“If it's not for them, who pays?”

No one answered.

An asked Ti if there were any more photos besides the 2:17 sequence. Ti searched the memory card. One file is corrupted, showing only half the frame: there is a truck on the shore, the license plate obscured by mud. Under the wheel is an operating order sheet, the corner of the paper reads "M-07 / south branch".

“Where did you take the picture from?”

“From Mom's warehouse.”

“Are you going out that night?”

Ti nodded. "I heard the sound of the machine, I was afraid my mother would lose the goods."

An looked at him. “Next time don't go alone.”

“If I don't go, will you know?”

An cannot say yes.

The editor decided to post a short news story, without naming the factory: "Moc Thuy floating market ran out of water after a series of hourly discharges; people requested to make operating records public." Posted in the afternoon.

An hour later, the factory responded: "The images are not enough to conclude that there is unusual behavior."

Two hours later, Ti received a text message from an unknown number:

"Nice photo. But do you still have the photo of the car?"

Ti did not answer. He took a screenshot, sent it to An and then turned off the phone. His mother asked who was texting, Ti said he was a friend in class. He didn't want his mother to know that someone was paying attention to the camera; Mom was worried enough because the market was closed.

An went to Ti's house with Khai. The house is located close to the shore, the foundation is lower than the new wharf. On the wall there is a photo of Ti's father building a boat, behind him is the river when it was still wide. Ti took out the memory card and placed it on the table.

“The car is no longer in the engine,” he said.

“You deleted?” An asked.

“No. It was its own fault.”

Khai checked the card. An area of data was overwritten, possibly because Ti took more photos later. But the photo's metadata remained on the copy An received.

“So the photo is not completely lost,” An said.

“I'm afraid someone will take my phone.”

“Let me keep the copy.”

Ti shook his head. "If you keep it, people will question you. If you keep it, they'll think you don't know anything."

Khai looked at him. “Don't use the fact that people look down on you as armor.”

Ti doesn't understand, An understands. She said she could divide the copy into multiple places and leave the original at Ti's place. He agreed, but asked everyone not to arbitrarily look at his mother's private photos.

They restored the photo in the school computer room. Information technology teachers guide you in finding data that has not been overwritten. The photo appears in segments: the front of the car, the taillights, the gray trunk, and then part of the license plate. Not enough to read it all, but the tank code matches the secondary sedimentation tank code in the file.

“What evidence is this?” Ti asked.

“It shows a tanker truck passing close to the moment the valve opened,” An said.

“Didn't show who was driving.”

"Correct."

“Doesn't show what's in the box.”

"Correct."

“So my photo is not enough.”

An looked at him. "One brick cannot build a wharf. But no one says bricks are useless."

Khai added: "If you put the photo next to the vehicle schedule, entrance log and mud sample, it has more value."

Ti wrote the three words "put next to each other" in the notebook.

At the editorial office, An compared the box code with the factory delivery table. There were three trips using the same code. One trip on the day the market was dry, one trip the day before and one trip with no pick-up location. Duy said the delivery table could be wrong.

“Do you have the gate log?” An asked.

"Have."

"I need."

“Legislation has not yet given it.”

“So you don't have the right to send it?”

“I can ask.”

“I asked for it yesterday.”

Duy is not angry. he said His information is also being held by the legal department. The factory has just received an inspection request from the district, all data must go through one focal point.

“Who is that clue?”

“Ms. Van, head of legal affairs.”

Write down your name.

Khai returned to the old station to check the shift table. Shift 2:17 on the night of the sprint has the letter V, but the signature below is edited. He used a magnifying glass and saw that the old stroke was the word "Vinh", and the new stroke turned into a code.

“Who fixed it?” An asked.

“Someone who knows how to change names in the book.”

“Mrs. Hanh?”

"Maybe."

“Duy?”

"Don't know."

“Can you say anything with certainty?”

Khai looked at the paper. “I definitely saw the word Vinh before it was edited.”

An took a notebook and recorded his words in the minutes.

Ms. Sau called a meeting of boat owners. Some people want to pause all photos for fear of customers coming back. Ti stood outside and heard someone say "children should not be dragged into adult matters".

Ti walked in. "I wasn't dragged. I took the photo myself."

The other person said: "Do you know who you're taking pictures of?"

"Are not."

“So it's even more dangerous.”

“If you don't know, you have to record the time.”

No one laughed. Mrs. Sau told Ti to sit down, then asked everyone not to use him as a shield or target.

At night, An posted an article explaining how to verify photos: photos are not a judgment, but they should not be deleted just because they are not enough. She publicly disclosed the time, shooting angle, lost data and unanswered questions.

The next morning, the factory sent a letter asking the editor to remove the article for "using images of minors". The editor asked Ti and his mother. Ti agreed to keep the photo, but hid his face and did not write his name.

When An reopened the folder, a new file appeared. The file name is time 2:17, the content only has the sound of the pump and someone saying:

“This box cannot go through the market.”

An did not delete Ti's message. She saved the strange number in her file, but told Ti not to answer so the sender wouldn't know the car still had a copy. Khai said that if the strange number was someone in the system, they might be testing to see if he was scared or not.

Ti asked: "What if I say there are no more photos?"

“That's a lie.”

“If you talk about it, it's dangerous.”

An looked at him. "You don't need to answer. Silence is also a form of protection."

Ti's mother heard it and said that adults often call silence for protection when they are afraid to speak. An did not object. She asked the editorial office not to mention Ti's name in the article, only to describe the source of the photo as a local student who agreed to provide it.

Editor sends preview. Below the photo is the caption "time of recording". An changed it to "at the time the camera recorded, the operator was unknown". The line is longer but more correct.

Khai took a mud sample next to the vehicle mark and placed it next to the sample at M-07. The two models have different colors, but he said his eyes weren't enough. They sent both to the lab with the same ticket.

In the evening, Ti stood by the window looking at the wharf. He didn't take photos of strangers, just the light bulbs reflecting on the water. In the photo, a red spot appears in the distance, right at 2:17.