Chapter 4: The Sound of Copper

Chapter 4: The Sound of Copper

The rage was a physical thing, a high-frequency vibration in Kaelen’s bones. He stood at his workbench, a heavy-duty spanner in his hand, his knuckles white. He wasn't working. He was staring at the half-assembled transmission before him, seeing nothing but Mark Thompson’s sneering face, hearing nothing but that venomous whisper: Never trust a coloured man with a hoody on.

Every instinct screamed at him to act. To throw the spanner through the plate-glass window of the manager’s office. To walk over to Thompson, look him dead in the eye, and unload every ounce of the fury that was threatening to choke him. To simply drop his tools on the floor, walk out the door, and never come back.

The last option was the most seductive. To just leave. To deny them his skill, his labour, his presence. It would be a clean break, a middle finger to the whole rotten establishment. But as the thought took hold, it soured. Quitting was an escape, not a victory. It would leave Thompson untouched, smug in his petty kingdom, his prejudices validated. He would have successfully driven out the Black mechanic. Kaelen would be just another story Thompson would tell his mates down the pub, proof of his own warped worldview. No. Running was a surrender, and the man who had been born in the wake of that insult did not surrender.

The cold, clear purpose that had crystallized within him demanded more. It demanded a reckoning. But to deliver it, he had to stay. He had to breathe the same foul air, walk the same grease-stained floors. He had to keep his rage on a leash, transforming it from a wild, destructive beast into a patient, calculating predator.

He forced his hands to unclench. He placed the spanner down with deliberate care. He needed an outlet, a focus point. More than that, he needed to understand the creature he was now hunting. He needed to find its weakness. Every engine had a flaw, a point of failure. Men were no different.

When the bell rang for the afternoon break, Kaelen did something he rarely did. He went to the canteen and sat not in his usual corner, but at a table closer to the centre, a vantage point. He didn’t bring food. He just brought a bottle of water and his unwavering, observant gaze.

He watched as Dave Williams, his face etched with the familiar lines of financial worry, shuffled into the room. Dave always looked like a man drowning in slow motion, his movements tired, his shoulders perpetually slumped. He bypassed the tea urn and went straight to the corner where Thompson had set up his personal business venture: a small tuck shop consisting of a few boxes of crisps, chocolate bars, and a cooler of fizzy drinks.

Taped to the wall above it was a hand-scrawled sign: “SNACKS & DRINKS. ALL ITEMS £1. Please Put PROPER MONEY in the Tin. 50p & £1 COINS ONLY!!!”

It was a petty fiefdom, a way for Thompson to skim a few extra quid off the lads each week. Most managers would have just put out an honesty box. Thompson had to turn it into a system, another small way to exert control.

Dave picked out a can of cheap energy drink, the kind that cost sixty pence in a shop. He fumbled in his pocket, his face falling as he pulled out a small handful of loose change. It was a motley collection of bronze and silver: 10ps, 5ps, and a cascade of 1p and 2p coins. He counted it out, his lips moving silently. He was short of a pound coin, but he clearly had enough to cover the cost.

Just then, Thompson himself bustled in, heading for the tea. He saw Dave standing by the snack corner, his hand hovering over the payment tin.

“Problem, Williams?” Thompson’s voice was sharp, laced with suspicion.

Dave flinched. “No, gaffer. Just… I’ve only got this.” He held out his palm, showing the collection of coins. “It’s a pound, maybe a bit more. Can I just…?”

Thompson’s face contorted into a mask of theatrical disgust, as if Dave had tried to pay him with live insects. “What did I tell you? What does the sign say?” He jabbed a thick finger towards his scrawled notice. “‘PROPER MONEY’. Is that proper money? It looks like the contents of a beggar’s cup.”

The canteen, already quiet, fell silent. Everyone was watching.

“It’s all I’ve got on me,” Dave mumbled, his face flushing a deep, painful red. The public humiliation was a physical force, pressing him down.

“Not my problem, is it?” Thompson sneered. “I’m not running a currency exchange. It’s an honesty box, not a bloody wishing well for you to offload your shrapnel. I’ve got to bag all that up, take it to the bank… it’s a hassle. A hassle I don’t need. Get yourself a pound coin like a normal person.”

With a final, dismissive wave, Thompson turned his back on Dave and poured his tea. Defeated, Dave let the coins fall back into his pocket with a sad little jingle. He put the can back and shuffled out of the canteen, his shoulders even lower than before.

Kaelen watched the entire exchange, and the chaotic, vibrating rage inside him suddenly stopped. It focused. The predator had found a scent.

It was so small. So pathetic. An obsession with ‘proper money’. A deep-seated revulsion for the inconvenience of copper and small silver. It was a character flaw, a tiny crack in the man's armour of blustering authority. And in that moment, Kaelen knew he had found it. He had found his weapon. A weapon Thompson himself had just advertised. A weapon the man wouldn’t see coming because it was beneath his contempt.

A slow, cold smile touched Kaelen’s lips for the first time that day. It didn’t reach his eyes. His eyes were fixed on the metal payment tin, the gears of a precise and malicious plan turning smoothly in his mind.

That night, he didn’t sleep. The exhaustion he should have felt was burned away by the clean, pure energy of his new purpose. In his small kitchen, under the stark light of a single bulb, he took down three large glass jars from a high shelf. They were heavy, filled with years of accumulated loose change he’d emptied from his pockets and never bothered to count.

He tipped the first jar onto his kitchen table. A great, clattering wave of copper and silver spread across the wood.

He began to count.

Methodically, he separated the coins into piles. He ignored the silver—the 50s, 20s, and 10s. He was interested only in the lowest of the low. The coppers. The 1p and 2p pieces that Thompson found so offensive.

The sound filled the quiet flat. A steady, rhythmic clink… clink… clink… as he stacked them. It wasn't just counting. It was a ritual. It was the sound of ammunition being chambered. Each coin was a grievance given weight and form.

Clink. A 2p piece for the hand in his hair. Clink. A 1p piece for ‘jungle’ and ‘lions’. Clink. Another 2p for Geoff’s complicit laughter. Clink. A whole stack of ten pennies for the humiliation in the canteen. And for the hoody… for the hoody, he set aside the dirtiest, most tarnished coins he could find.

He counted out four hundred pennies. Four pounds. The clinking of the copper was a strangely satisfying sound. It was the sound of a plan taking shape. It was the sound of nails being forged. Each one, a nail for Mark Thompson's coffin. He swept them all into a heavy-duty canvas bag, the weight of it in his hand feeling solid, real, and full of promise. The hunt was over. The trap was about to be set.