Sera’s first chalk mark vanished under a sheet of runoff.
She and Kellan were standing at a public drainage access point two streets from the waterworks. The morning had been dry, but water released from an upstream maintenance operation surged through the channel without warning. It struck the wall below them and sent spray over the rim.
Kellan caught Sera’s equipment case before it slid toward the opening. “Back.”
She stepped away. The chalk arrow she had drawn on the pavement dissolved into a pale streak. Her notebook remained dry under her coat, but the measuring tape lay half across the grate. Kellan pulled it back with a hook rather than reaching into the flow.
“I thought the channel was low,” Sera said.
“It was when we looked.”
A maintenance worker across the street called that the utility had begun flushing an isolated section after the chemical leak. The flow would continue for another twenty minutes. He apologized; the notice had been posted at the plant entrance, not at this public grate.
“Can you tell us before the next release?” Kellan asked.
