All Chapters of Bringing Sulfuric Acid to a Water Fight: Chapter 1 - Chapter 9

But right then, I could feel it clearly. Beyond the pain, the skin around my eye was turning red and starting to itch.That wasn't normal. There had to be something else mixed into that water gun. The thought sent an involuntary shiver through me.The young man with the stab wound on his hand was shouting now, furious. "You all saw how hard this little brat went at me, right? The apple doesn't fall far from the tree! Spray the gun, right now, or we're dragging you to the station ourselves!"The father's eyes darted left and right, but his finger wouldn't touch the trigger.It wasn't because he'd actually loaded the gun with acid. It was because he didn't know what was in it. His daughter was the kind of kid who'd dump ink, glue, even piss into a water gun on any given day, and he'd probably never once checked. What if this time, just this once, it really was something dangerous?His hesitation only confirmed what everybody had already suspected.The scene exploded into chaos.

The technician's voice was quiet, but it reverberated in the interrogation room like a thunderclap.Sandra's sneer hadn't even fully left her face before it froze in place."A special substance? What special substance? Quit trying to scare everyone! You just said it was tap water!" Derek's voice climbed higher.The technician ignored him entirely and handed the report to the lead officer. His gaze landed on Sandra's face with surgical precision."We detected a high concentration of a methamphetamine derivative in the water sample.""A what?"Derek stared blankly, completely lost. But Sandra, standing right beside him, went from arrogant to deathly pale in the span of a single breath.Something lurched in my chest. The chemical name sounded familiar, but I couldn't quite place it. One look at Sandra's reaction, though, told me everything I needed to know. Whatever this was, it was far worse than sulfuric acid."In layman's terms, it's a new form of liquid narcotic. The concentra

The young man asked, "Hey, is your eye okay? You sure you don't need to get it checked at the hospital?"I shook my head. "The cops said the solution was diluted enough that it shouldn't be serious, just enough to cause an allergic reaction. It should clear up in a couple of days."While we were talking, a black Mercedes van soundlessly glided to a stop in front of us. The window rolled down, and a middle-aged man in gold-rimmed glasses leaned out."Excuse me, are you Mr. Blake? The gentleman who filed the report?"I eyed him warily. "Who's asking?""My name is Gerald Crawford. I'm Ms. Kessler's legal counsel. Ms. Kessler and her husband are currently unable to speak with you in person, so she's asked me to handle a few matters on their behalf."I didn't take his business card.The guy beside me got heated first. "Handle what? She's already been hauled in. What else is there to handle?"Gerald seemed to have expected this reaction. His expression didn't change, the professional

I remarked, "The bigger the stunt, the harder the fall. He thinks public opinion is his weapon, but he's forgotten that it cuts both ways."Derek's desperation went further than I ever expected.After unleashing the full force of his bot army to destroy my reputation online, he dressed himself and Bree in white and camped outside the front entrance of the city police headquarters. Bree still hadn't spoken a single word since the incident.He'd brought an army of reporters and social media influencers with him. He sobbed into every camera that would point his way, wailing that his wife had been framed by a con artist and that his family had been torn apart by a vindictive stranger.He railed against the justice system, accused the police of being on my payroll, and called the entire case a fabrication from start to finish.Bree sat in his arms through it all, her face blank, her eyes hollow, like a rag doll.The footage went viral instantly.Public opinion began to shift. More an