Those Who Flow Through Fire

An extract from The London Tube

“Move and we shoot!”

The soldiers descended without hurry, taking the platform one step at a time. Harvey and Cole stood on the opposite side, the staircase between them and the formation that was slowly closing in.

When they reached the bottom, the soldiers removed their gas masks. The air was still breathable here, yet their faces remained as unreadable as the visors they had just discarded.

Harvey felt his pulse rising into his temples.

Cole did not seem affected at all.

He raised his arm and held up the detonator, the black casing dull beneath the station lights, the worn red button fixed between his fingers.

“No,” he said coldly. “You don’t move. Idiots… can you see what I’m holding, or are you blind?”

The soldiers remained where they were.

Weapons raised.

Calculating.

“What do you think this is?” Cole continued, his voice low and steady. “A toy? I’m talking to you, crooked nose. If I were in your place, I’d start paying attention to where I’m standing.”

Almost instinctively, their eyes dropped.

Too late.

The charges were already there.

Fixed to the walls at waist height.

Not too high.

Not too low.

Exactly where the blast would leave no room for mistakes.

Several soldiers took a step backwards before stopping themselves.

Cole smiled.

“That’s better. Now we understand each other.”

He lifted the detonator slightly.

“No panic. No heroics. Maybe we can speak like civilised people. Look carefully at those bombs. If I press this button, they bite. Knees. Throats. Whatever they can reach. I’ve planted charges all over this perimeter and every one of them answers to me.”

He held up the detonator again.

“To this.”

Silence settled across the platform.

Even the echoes seemed to retreat.

Then an older man stepped forward.

White hair.

Red eyes.

The face of someone who had slept too little for too many years.

“I don’t think you’ll press it,” he said. “You know what happens if you do? You die too. Along with us. That bomb takes you and your friend with it.”

The man smiled.

Not a friendly smile.

A challenge.

Cole’s jaw tightened.

For a moment, the veins in his neck stood out beneath the grime.

“Harvey,” he said without turning around. “Enough. They don’t understand. They don’t understand that I’m ready to die with them.”

His grip tightened on the detonator.

“Put your mask on and leave.”

“But Cole—”

“No. Go.”

For the first time, Harvey realised he was not looking at a man trying to survive.

He was looking at a man who had already made peace with death.