‘So you gonna thank me for saving your life?’ Mitchell panted, wiping a forearm across his brow.

Saul forced himself to meet Mitchell’s calm blue gaze. ‘What are you waiting for?’ he demanded. ‘Aren’t you going to finish the job now?’

‘Saul,’ Mitchell’s voice was almost gentle, ‘hey were going to kill you, is what it looked like to me.’ He nodded towards the departure area. ‘Didn’t you listen to one damn thing I said? We’ll be transformed, and so will the colonies. Then we can live for ever. I just wish Jeff and Olivia could have been here to share in it.’

‘You’re out of your fucking mind,’ Saul shouted. ‘Back there you said you wanted to kill me.’

Mitchell laughed. ‘That was when I thought you posed a significant threat, but now you’re unarmed and defenceless. Look,’ he said, gesturing towards the departure area, with a radiant smile on his face.

Saul looked, and saw a heat-haze like shimmer make the air tremble at the top of the escalators. The low rumble had given way to a kind of ululation, like the wordless moan of a million massed voices, and growing incrementally louder by the second.

‘If you’re not going to kill me, that means you’ll let me go?’

‘No, I want you right here with me, because I can’t take any chances on you doing something stupid, not now. Come on.’

Mitchell stepped closer and took a grip on Saul’s upper arm. Saul tried to break loose and Mitchell yanked him closer still, twisting his arm behind his back, and then putting a stranglehold on him before pushing his face up against the wall.

‘Saul,’ he hissed in his ear, ‘be reasonable. I know you don’t believe me, but I’m genuinely trying to help you.’

The ululation had begun to infiltrate Saul’s brain, like a score of icy needles working their way into his skull. He was finding it harder to concentrate, to even think.

He realized that an icon was blinking in one corner of his eye. How long had it been there without him noticing?

Seeing it was from Amy Rose, he activated the link.

‘Let’s go,’ said Mitchell, stepping back while dragging Saul along with him, his other arm tight around Saul’s neck.

Barely able to breathe, Saul tried to break loose, but the slightest movement sent shards of agony shooting through his shoulder. Mitchell was meanwhile dragging him towards the escalators, closer to the strangely shimmering air.

‘Saul?’ he heard Amy say inside his head. ‘Give me a sign that you can hear me. I can see you, but where is he taking you?’

I’m not sure, Saul tried to reply, but Mitchell’s grip around his neck was too tight.

Mitchell came to a halt. ‘You’re talking to someone.’

‘No,’ Saul managed to croak. How the hell could he have known?