Chapter 10
Kaden picked up a copy of the Metro before they got on the train to Brighton. Joe felt Kaden’s anxiety rise when he read the article about the meteorite. The site had been identified and there was a picture of the Lixian building.
There’s nothing for them to find.
“That won’t stop people looking.”
Don’t worry.
“I suppose it will all die down.”
He hoped it did. Look out of the window.
Joe loved the train journey to Brighton in a way that felt almost overwhelming.
It wasn’t just movement, it was seeing. He made Kaden keep his gaze fixed to the window, silently narrating everything they passed.
The blur of green fields. Animals grazing.
Birds wheeling against the pale sky. Rows of crops stretching in careful lines across the land.
On his planet, travel had never been like this.
Short distances meant flight, his own wings slicing through open air.
Longer journeys happened inside sealed, windowless tubes, silent and efficient.
You didn’t see landscapes. You didn’t see people.
You simply arrived. But this slow unfolding of the world felt miraculous.
If the train had been extraordinary, the sea was something else entirely.
It blew his mind. He understood that expression now.
He kept Kaden staring as the colours shifted endlessly, blue dissolving into green, then deepening into iron-grey.
The wind lashed the surface of the water, whipping it into motion.
Waves rose and curled, crashing against the shingle with a force that seemed almost violent, only to be dragged back again, hissing angrily, before surging forward once more.
The air tasted sharp. Alive. Gulls cried overhead, their voices slicing through the roar of the water.
“It’s lovely, isn’t it?”
Wonderful. The word felt too small. He used it for so much.
Joe absorbed everything. He always did. Faces, voices, movements. He watched people, trying to understand the rhythm of being human. But most of all, he watched Kaden. He listened to him, felt him and adored him.
Kaden was the bravest individual he had ever known. Joe had given him no choice, that truth was painfully heavy, but Kaden had adapted. He hadn’t broken. Sometimes he even laughed. Sometimes he enjoyed it.
Joe was in awe of him.
They walked along the promenade, back and forth, the sea always there beside them, vast and unknowable. On the other side, in an arcade, lights flashed and machines chimed. The contrast amused him.
“Want to go in?” Kaden asked.
Yes.
Joe couldn’t help himself. He sharpened Kaden’s reactions in a driving game, just a little, pushing him faster and faster until the machine erupted in bells.
“Did you help me?” Kaden sighed. “Don’t answer. I know you did.”
Kaden’s disappointment stung and Joe withdrew immediately, regret flooding through him. He hadn’t meant to take the experience away, only to share in it.
But Kaden didn’t stay upset. With the cascade of tokens he’d won, he bought sweets; sharp, sugary bursts that Joe found oddly addictive and a soft toy that folded in on itself, transforming from a blue ball into a penguin.
“I’ll call him Joe,” Kaden whispered.
Something inside Joe shifted and his hearts ached.
Fish and chips for lunch. Hot and salty, covered with vinegar and wrapped in paper translucent with grease. Kaden drank something fizzy from a can. The sensation exploded across Joe’s awareness and he gasped.
Kaden burped and they both laughed.
Every moment felt precious. And still, beneath it all, Joe carried the quiet fear of not knowing enough, that he was missing something vital.
“Thank you for helping me learn Pashto,” Kaden said suddenly. “And all that stuff you read…especially about volcanoes. You won me money in the pub quiz.”
Joe didn’t understand how Kaden could thank him for anything.
It was Joe who owed Kaden everything. A chance at this world.
At living in it. Even if it ended tomorrow, his only regret would be hurting Kaden.
Always hurting him. Joe desperately wished he could hold him properly.
Wrap him in his arms. Feel the reality of contact instead of this shared existence.
Instead, he settled for what he could do, which was to softly trace along Kaden’s back from the inside, a gentle pressure, hopefully do more than remind Kaden he was there.
And promise himself that if he survived, he’d make sure that Gash and Lanu didn’t.
Kaden sighed. Then suddenly choked.
What is it? What’s wrong?
“Oh God… I don’t think about it, and then I suddenly do.” His voice shrank to a whisper. “I might die, mightn’t I?”
Joe stilled. There was no way to answer that without breaking something. But lying would be worse. Kaden already knew that might happen.
You might die.
The words felt heavy but unavoidable.
“You too?”
Yes. But I will do everything I can to stop that happening.
The truth beneath that remained unspoken: that Joe would die before he let that happen to Kaden.
“If it’s my last day, it’s been a good one.”
Joe couldn’t answer. There was too much inside that sentence.
On the bus back in London, heading toward the hospital, a thought struck Joe suddenly.
You might need a reason for being in the hospital.
“I can say my pacemaker felt wrong. Like a blip. There probably will be one when you come out.” He gave a small, quiet chuckle.
Maybe. But not if Joe could help it.
“I wish you could hold my hand,” Kaden said softly.
Joe focused everything he had into that moment, sending sensation through Kaden’s fingers, a gentle tightening, an echo of touch from within.
Kaden exhaled. “Talk to me.”
About what?
“Your planet. You’ve not said much. I wish I could see pictures.”
Joe hesitated, then let the images form.
Our cities stretch in long lines across the land, like spokes from a wheel.
Fifty storeys high. Connected by transport routes that never stop moving.
We grow food in protected zones. Everything is precise and controlled.
We live in small pods. We know only those around us.
Those we work with. Those engineered in the same way.
“Engineered to be a protector or a hunter or one of the other roles?”
Yes.
“Do you miss it?”
No.
“Can you show me what you look like?”
Joe hesitated. Are you sure you want to know?
“Yes.”
Don’t freak out.
He let the image unfold—his true form, unhidden.
Wings. Multifaceted face. Four arms ending in claws.
Two spindly but strong legs. Large, unblinking eyes.
Blue, scaled skin that caught the light.
Spikes on his back. Spikes on his arms. One spike on his curved tail. And his wings. He’d loved his wings.
Then he waited for fear, for revulsion.
“Oh,” Kaden breathed. “You’re beautiful.”
Joe’s hearts trembled. Beautiful? He had never—never—been called that.
“You’re like an armour-plated dragonfly crossed with a…scorpion.”
Does it disturb you?
“No.” A soft pause. “Thank you for showing me.”
Kaden fell quiet after that.
Not even thinking.
Just…being.
And for the first time since the journey began, Joe felt something close to stillness settle inside him. It was fragile and no doubt fleeting, but real.
This had to be done and Kaden had to live.
As Kaden walked into the hospital, he kept his hoodie pulled low and his head down, shoulders hunched like he was trying to fold himself into the fabric.
Joe knew he was trying to avoid being caught by the cameras, but he wondered if Kaden felt he was heading to his doom?
If so, he was hiding it. Joe made it feel as if he was holding Kaden’s hand.
“I’ve tried to think of everything you might need,” Kaden whispered.
Inside the backpack slung over one shoulder was another backpack, a tatty one, carefully filled with a T-shirt, underwear, jogging bottoms and a towel.
There was also a small amount of cash. Most importantly, there was a plastic envelope holding a signed letter from Kaden stating that Jalis could stay with him, a utility bill to prove Kaden was resident at that address and a note saying he couldn’t afford to completely support him.
That would ensure his eligibility for the grant.
“How did you get those if we hadn’t met?” Kaden asked.
You posted them to Afghanistan. The energy bill is from a couple of months ago. That will work.
“Okay. If they ask where you got the backpack and the clothes from, say a charity shop.”
Yes.
Kaden began a thought and then snapped it off.
What were you going to say?
“Look for all the routes out of here.” Kaden barely moved his lips. “And any cameras that might be watching. You remember where the police station is, right?”
Yes. You pointed it out. But I’ve had a thought too. Perhaps you ought to hide the letter, the bill and the note. It links us and linking us brings too many questions if either of us are injured.
“Okay. That’s a good idea. Except I don’t know where I can hide them.”
Kaden went to three different bathrooms before choosing one on the third floor.
The first two had been busy. This one was empty.
There was no out-of-order sign to use. Joe could feel Kaden’s heart beginning to hammer.
He tried to calm it, to smooth the rhythm from the inside, but his own hearts were racing too, overlapping pulses of fear and urgency because no matter how much he knew what he wanted to happen, he couldn’t be sure of the outcome.
How about hiding them in that gap at the bottom of the sink pedestal?
“The one at the end. Okay. I’ll do that.”
It can’t be seen.