Chapter 5: The First Payment

Chapter 5: The First Payment

Kaelen walked through the main doors of the workshop the next morning, and for the first time in a long time, the familiar scent of rust and oil did not feel like a sanctuary. It felt like a battlefield. The canvas bag of coins was a dense, heavy weight in the deep pocket of his overalls, a comforting anchor grounding him in his purpose. It pulled at the fabric with every step, a constant, physical reminder of the promise he had made to himself in the stark light of his kitchen.

He clocked in, his face an unreadable mask of calm. There was no trace of the seething fury that had kept him awake all night, counting out his copper ammunition. That fury had been smelted down, cooled, and sharpened into a single, lethal point. He looked different. The weary stoicism was gone, replaced by a quiet, unnerving stillness. A few of the other mechanics nodded a greeting, and he returned it with a slow, deliberate nod of his own, his gaze steady and direct. He was a predator who had learned to walk among the herd without betraying the hunger in his eyes.

He spent the first hour of his shift working with an almost supernatural focus, his hands moving with fluid efficiency. He diagnosed a tricky electrical fault in a new Mercedes Actros, his mind a cool, clear machine of logic and process. But a part of him was separate, detached, watching the clock on the wall. Waiting. He was a trapper, and the morning was the slow, patient process of setting the line. The real work would begin soon.

At ten minutes to ten, just before the official morning break, he wiped his hands on a rag and began the walk to the canteen. The heavy bag thumped softly against his thigh. He passed Geoff, who offered a weak, tight-lipped smile that didn’t meet his eyes. Kaelen gave him nothing back, his expression as flat and hard as sheet metal. The memory of Geoff’s laughter at the ‘smoke signals’ jibe was a fresh wound, another debt to be collected.

The canteen was mostly empty, save for a couple of apprentices finishing an early break. Kaelen walked directly to Thompson’s tuck shop corner. He surveyed the sad little collection of overpriced snacks. His eyes flickered to the hand-scrawled sign—PROPER MONEY ONLY!!!—and he thought of Dave Williams’s humiliated retreat the day before. This was for Dave, too. This was for every casual cruelty Thompson inflicted to feel like a big man.

Kaelen calmly selected his items. A can of coke. A can of Fanta. A Mars bar. A Snickers bar. Four pounds exactly. He held the items in the crook of his arm and turned to the payment tin, a simple metal cash box with a slot in the top. It was Thompson's throne, the symbol of his petty tyranny.

He took a slow, deep breath. He thought of Thompson’s fleshy hand in his hair, the sneer on his face, the ignorant words about Africa. He thought of the canteen campaign, the sneering lecture on IQ. Most of all, he heard that venomous whisper in his memory, as clear as if the man was standing right behind him: Never trust a coloured man with a hoody on.

This, then, was the reply.

In one smooth, deliberate motion, Kaelen pulled the heavy canvas bag from his pocket. He positioned it over the slot in the metal tin. And he upended it.

The sound was magnificent. It wasn't the gentle plink of a few coins. It was a roar. A deafening, metallic cascade of four hundred copper coins crashing into the thin metal box. It was a waterfall of shrapnel, a furious, clattering avalanche of contempt that echoed through the quiet canteen like a gunshot. It was the sound of a gauntlet being thrown down, of a line being crossed, of a war being declared. The apprentices at the far table looked up, their eyes wide with shock.

Kaelen didn’t flinch. He let the last coin rattle into the tin, then calmly folded the empty bag and tucked it back into his pocket. He picked up his four items and walked out, leaving the thunder of his payment hanging in the air behind him.

Back at his workstation, the waiting began. He was perfectly still inside, coiled like a spring. Every nerve was alight, every sense tuned to the workshop’s rhythms. He opened his can of coke and took a long, slow sip. It tasted like victory. He set about his work, but his ears were trained on the manager’s office, listening for the first tremor of the coming earthquake. He anticipated the explosion, the precise moment Thompson would open his precious tin and discover the desecration within.

It came at three minutes past ten.

A roar of pure, incoherent rage erupted from the office, so loud it momentarily drowned out the whine of a nearby angle grinder. The door flew open with a crash, and Mark Thompson stormed out, his face not just red, but a mottled, terrifying shade of purple. His cheap tie was askew, his eyes bulging. He held the metal tin in his hands, shaking it as if it were full of wasps.

He didn't stop in the workshop. He marched straight towards the canteen, where the rest of the mechanics were now gathered for their break. Kaelen put his spanner down, wiped his hands, and began to follow him at a calm, unhurried pace. He wouldn’t be summoned. He would arrive.

By the time Kaelen reached the canteen door, Thompson was in full tirade.

“WHO?!” he bellowed, his voice cracking with fury. He slammed the tin down on a table, the coins inside rattling with a dull, heavy clank. “Who thinks they’re a comedian? Who did this?!”

The mechanics stared, some in fear, some with a flicker of amusement they tried desperately to hide. No one spoke. The silence was thick with tension.

“I’m not asking again!” Thompson screamed, his gaze sweeping across their faces, searching for a sign of guilt. “This is a direct challenge to my authority! This is sabotage! Which one of you pathetic morons did it?”

Kaelen stepped through the doorway. He moved with a quiet grace that drew every eye in the room. He walked past the silent mechanics and stopped a few feet from Thompson, his chosen snacks still held loosely in his hand.

He met the manager’s raging, bloodshot eyes.

“It was me,” Kaelen said. His voice was not loud, but it cut through the room with absolute clarity. There was no apology in it. No fear. Only a calm, simple statement of fact.

Thompson’s jaw worked, but no sound came out. He stared at Kaelen, utterly dumbfounded. This was not the reaction he had expected. He had anticipated a nervous confession from some frightened apprentice he could bully into submission. He had not anticipated this calm, direct defiance from the quiet Black mechanic.

“I bought two drinks and two chocolate bars,” Kaelen continued, his voice still perfectly even. He gestured to the items in his arm. “That comes to four pounds. I paid four pounds.”

“With… with that?!” Thompson sputtered, pointing a trembling finger at the tin full of copper. “That’s not proper money! The sign says—”

“The sign is your preference, not the law,” Kaelen interrupted, his tone chillingly reasonable. “Those are one- and two-pence coins. They are legal tender for any amount up to twenty pence in a single transaction. I made twenty separate transactions of twenty pence each. It’s all perfectly legal. I paid.”

He let the words hang in the air. He had used the man’s own petty obsession against him, wrapping his defiance in a cloak of irrefutable, pedantic logic. He had followed the letter of the law, while violating the spirit of Thompson’s tyranny with spectacular precision.

The entire canteen was frozen, watching the standoff. Kaelen didn't move. He just held Thompson’s gaze, his eyes cold and unwavering. The predator had sprung his trap, and the beast was now raging within it, confused, furious, and for the first time, utterly powerless.