Aidan loved space. He knew everything that was possible to know about space, he designed and built spacecraft out of Lego, all the time. When the sky was clear at night, Aidan went out to the garden with Dad and they looked at stars and planets through a telescope.

Whenever Aidan was upset, and he did not want to go to school, he sighed: ‘Let’s go to space instead.’

Aidan especially wanted to go to the Red Planet: Mars.

One morning, Aidan was woken up by Mum from a beautiful dream of his, about living on Mars. As you can imagine, he was not very happy. He turned back to the wall, hugged his cuddly toy rocket: Cuddlaunch, and tried to get back to his wonderful dream.

‘Aidan, please get up. Now!’, Mum said the umpteenth time in a slightly raised voice. ‘You need to go to school.’

‘Let’s go to Mars instead’, Aidan murmured to himself and pulled the blanket on his head.

Mum pulled the blanket off: ‘Get up now’, she said.

‘OK, OK’, Aidan grumbled.

Aidan’s head was still full of his dream as he was walking towards the school. This is how it took him some time before realising that he was not alone. There was a strange creature walking next to him: he had three legs, each leg had five joints that let them bend in practically any direction. The creature’s body was small and round but he had three arms coming out of it, five joints each, plus three long fingers with five joints each and no palm. His head was huge compared to his body and a sort of balloon shape. Three eyes moving independently from each other, no nose and a strange, little, pump-like mouth. No ears but three elastic feelers, one on each side and one on the back of his head. It was a sort of dusty reddish colour except for his feelers and his three eyes, those were bright red.

‘Hello’, Aidan said.

You see, he was not as surprised to find a Martian walking next to him as you or I would be. Aidan actually expected this to happen any minute since he was deep in his studies about space, especially Mars.

The creature blinked with two of his eyes and touched Aidan’s hand with two of its fingers of his closest arm.

Aidan shivered, since the creature’s touch was surprisingly cold and somewhat electric. Then he noticed that the Martian had actually given him something: a tiny white box with a single tiny white button on it.

What would you have down in this situation? Well, Aidan thought for a moment, looked the creature in as many eyes as he was able to, and bravely pushed the button.

‘Hi Aidan’, the creature said. ‘I’m STOD-0011.’

Well, he actually did not make any noise, and his lips did not move since he had no lips to start with.

‘What’s happening?’, Aidan asked. ‘Nice to meet you, STOD-0011’, he added.

‘We are connected now’, the creature communicated towards him in his own silent way, ‘No need to talk. Just think and I can hear it.’

‘This is awesome’, Aidan thought.

And the Martian answered: ‘This is a bit more effective way of communication than your human one.’

‘It certainly is’, Aidan smiled.

The next moment, Aidan panicked. The creature had just disappeared without trace.

‘Don’t worry’, the Martian reassured him, ‘I’m still here, I’ve just switched visibility off. It takes a lot of energy, you know.’

‘I see’, Aidan thought, ‘I wish I could switch mine off sometimes.’

Pop! A red spark fell on the pavement and the old lady walking on the other side of the road, stopped abruptly. She could have sworn that there was a boy walking there a minute ago, and now, he was nowhere to be seen.

‘I’m going senile’, the old lady murmured to herself.

Aidan and the Martian silently laughed.

‘This is totally awesome!’, Aidan thought.

‘Well, it doesn’t solve everything’, the Martian sighed.

‘Doesn’t it?’, Aidan was surprised.

‘You see’, STOD-0011 explained, ‘back home, all of us can do this, so it doesn’t help at all when you actually want to hide.’

‘I see’, Aidan thought.

He turned around, enjoying his invisibility a lot.

‘You have to come with me’, the Martian exclaimed.

‘With pleasure’, Aidan was really happy, ‘I’ve always wanted to go to Mars. But–’, he stopped, ‘I have to go to school now.’

‘We’ll send a hologram’, the Martian reassured him.

Aidan seemed a bit unsure: ‘Can a hologram do my French test?’

‘It can do everything that you can’, the Martian explained, ‘except misleading your family.’

‘Then we need to get back by the end of school day’, Aidan concluded.

‘We’ll try’, the Martian promised and with that, they were swirling incredibly fast through time and space.

Aidan had always known that he would enjoy space travel but he he had never thought that it was that smooth. They floated comfortably in the middle of a turbulent swirl. They had time to relax and watch the stars, they had time to chat.

‘What’s your planet like?’, Aidan asked the Martian.

‘Nothing special’, communicated the creature, bored.

Aidan thought for a moment. ‘Do you think Earth is anything special?’, he asked.

STOD-0011 thought about it for a while. Finally, he concluded. ‘Not really.’

‘I see’, Aidan said.

‘We are here’, said the Martian after a while.

Aidan looked and looked. ‘I can’t see a thing’, he finally confessed.

‘Of course you can’t’, the Martian laughed, ‘because you are expecting all that nonsense that earthlings’ “science” taught you about Mars.'

‘I see’, Aidan said, unsure.

‘No, you don’t’, the Martian laughed.

‘Then tell me’, Aidan said, somewhat irritated.

‘That’s a sham’, STOD-0011 explained. ‘You, earthlings are too curious. You don’t understand that Mars is none of your business. So we disguised our planet.’

‘And you are projecting a hologram for us to examine’, Aidan finally understood.

‘We do’, laughed the Martian, ‘and you believe it!’

Aidan was silent for a while.

‘If you so look down on us “earthlings”, why did you bring me here?’, he finally asked.

‘You still don’t get it, do you?’, STOD-0011 laughed.

‘I don’t get what?’, Aidan was angry now.

The Martian stopped laughing and looked Aidan in the eye: ‘Have you ever felt that you actually belong to that ridiculous human race?’

Aidan did not need time to think about the answer: ‘Not really.’

‘See?’, the Martian laughed again, ‘Brother!’

Aidan suddenly understood everything.

‘You’ve sent me there to spy’, he said.

‘We did’, the Martian confessed, ‘but we did miss you, little brother, all those years–’

‘Do you want me to tell you about Earth?’, Aidan asked.

‘No need’, STOD-0011 said, ‘We know everything you have ever thought about it.’

‘That’s handy’, Aidan said, angry. ‘So that white button on the white box was a sham, too?’

‘I didn’t want to scare you’, the Martian explained.

‘So what happens now– brother?’, Aidan asked, annoyed.

‘Your mission is over’, the Martian said.

‘And what shall I do now?’, Aidan asked. ‘What was the purpose of my mission, anyway?’

‘To upgrade the disguise of our planet’, explained the Martian, ‘and it’s done. It’s almost perfect.’

‘Almost?’, Aidan got interested.

‘Well’, the Martian sighed, ‘the problem is that we can’t see it either.’

Aidan burst into a laughter.

‘It’s not funny’, STOD-0011 shouted.

Aidan politely stopped laughing. ‘It is a bit’, he said smiling.

‘You need to help us’, the Martian said.

‘Why me?’, Aidan was surprised but definitely happy.

‘You know everything that is to know about our disguise. You are able to see it in a human way, too. You have more knowledge of it than any of us’, the Martian said.

‘I do?’, Aidan smiled. ‘Well’, he said, ‘I’m happy to help you upgrade the disguise so that humans can’t reach you so that you can live your normal life on Mars. On one condition.’

‘Whatever you want’, the Martian promised, ‘just help us to get back to normal.’

‘I’ll do my best’, Aidan promised.

It took him for a while to get used to the invisible lab that he had to work in. Let alone the invisible hot chocolate and the invisible toilet, and so on. But soon, Aidan was able to ignore invisibility. He worked day and night. His brothers and sisters assisted him happily.

‘Now’, Aidan said, a few weeks later, putting down his empty green mug on the yellow plastic table. ‘Since I am done here, let’s talk about the one condition I’ve mentioned earlier.’

‘Of course’, all the Martians listened to him.

‘You see, it’s nice to be here with you lot’, Aidan started, ‘but, to be honest, during my time on Earth, I grew quite fond of my human family. Especially Theobald, our old ginger cat–’

‘I knew it!’, STOD-0011 exclaimed, ‘I so knew it. “your old ginger cat”, huh? Bless great Theobald.’

‘I knew it!’, Aidan suddenly exclaimed. ‘He is one of us, isn’t he?’

‘This is the seven hundred and eighty fifth year that Theolbald spends on that silly planet’, sighed the Martian.

‘Well, in that case–’, Aidan started.

‘OK, OK’, the Martian said, annoyed, ‘You can stay, you can use your visibility switch and hologram as much as you like. Just make sure you visit us sometimes. Also, could you, please, remind dear old Theobald that his “vacation” is a bit longer than what we expected?’

‘I don’t think I will’, Aidan replied. ‘You see, our family would be devastated if he left Earth.’

‘You mean’, the Martian raised his inner voice a bit, ‘your so-called human family. Because his and your real family would actually be overjoyed if Theobald came back to where he belongs.’

‘I see’, Aidan said, evidently disagreeing.

He said goodbye to his brothers and sisters who thanked him a million times all that he had done for them, and he set the timer back to the end of that school day when he had left Earth, and switched the capsule on.

When he got home, he stroked Theobald and thought about many things at once.

‘You’re right’, Theobald meowed.