The fumes hit me like a wall. I doubled over coughing, eyes burning so badly that tears streamed down my face before I could stop them.
I fumbled for my phone, switched on the camera, and swept it across the fissure and the dead landscape around it.
"Look at this. There's a massive crack in the ground out here by the abandoned chemical plant on the west side of town, and some kind of gas is pouring out of it."
"Every rat in the area is running this way and diving underground."
"The smell is brutal. I think something's leaking beneath the surface. Stay away from the western suburbs. I mean it."
I uploaded the video to the local forum and a couple of short-video apps.
The second it finished posting, I grabbed Marmalade's carrier and started walking back.
I barely made it inside city limits before my phone went berserk, buzzing nonstop in my pocket.
I thought the authorities had seen the video and were reaching out.
I was wrong. The comment section was a sewer of insults.
Someone had already dug up the address of my stall and posted it with a warning telling everyone to boycott me, calling my pork unsafe.
My hands were shaking by the time I stopped scrolling.
Then Kathy called.
"Job, do you have a death wish?"
"Do you have any idea what you've done?"
I kept my voice level, barely. "I filmed what I saw. There's a real problem out in the western suburbs."
"Bullshit!" Kathy screamed into the phone.
"My great-aunt just called and ripped me a new one because of you."
"Did you even know that land's already been contracted by her company? They're building a luxury residential development out there."
"You post some made-up scare video and you think that's fine? You're trying to destroy her business!"
I froze.
Kathy's voice went cold. Ice cold.
"I'm telling you right now. Delete that video and post a public apology."
"If you don't, Great-Aunt Carina said she'll pull the lease on our stall. Immediately."
I clenched my jaw so hard my teeth ached. My nails dug crescents into my palms.
"I'm not deleting it." Each word came out slow and deliberate. "That video could save people's lives."
"Fine. You want to play tough?" A bitter laugh. "Then don't blame me for forgetting we're married."
The line went dead.
I stood there on the sidewalk, phone still pressed to my ear, listening to silence.
I didn't go back to the stall. I hailed a cab straight to our apartment.
All I needed was a change of clothes and my bank card, and then I was getting out of this city.
But when I shoved my key into the lock, it wouldn't turn. Not a millimeter.
They'd changed the lock. I pounded on the security door. "Kathy! Open up!"
The door swung inward, but it wasn't Kathy standing behind it. It was her father, Frank Matthews.
He looked me up and down like I was something stuck to the bottom of his shoe.
"Well, well. The big internet celebrity's home."
His lip curled. "You've got nerve showing your face here. You've dragged the whole Matthews name through the mud."
I tried to push past him. "Just let me grab my things. Then I'm gone."
"Stay right there." Frank Matthews planted a hand on my chest and shoved.
I stumbled backward, and the carrier in my hand slammed hard against the hallway wall.
Marmalade let out a thin, pained cry from inside.
"Grab your things? What things?" Frank blocked the doorway. "Name one thing in this apartment my daughter didn't pay for."
"You can't even give her a child. You're useless. You eat our food, you drink our water, and now you go online and spread lies to sabotage my niece's business?"
"I'm telling you, until that video comes down, you don't set one foot inside this door."
I took a long, slow breath.
"Dad, there's toxic gas leaking in the western suburbs. The rats are fleeing. If you won't leave, fine. But I'm going."
Frank Matthews spat. The glob landed squarely on the toe of my shoe.
"Don't try to scare people with your little rat story. They ran because there's nothing left to eat out there."
"Now hand over your phone and delete that video. Right here, right now, where I can see it."
