The security guard on duty this particular night is called Dalmar. Dalmar takes his job very seriously. Although his main task is to be on hand for the Customer Services Manager, it is also down to him to check the station for suspicious objects every two hours; each of the seven platforms, the waiting rooms, the toilets. Dalmar has never found anything suspicious but he has taken the HOT principle (Hidden? Obvious? Typical?) to heart. Dalmar comes from Somalia, the UK gave him sanctuary twelve years ago and his dreams are haunted by the bombs he will never find. He is proud that his job includes an element of protecting the British public from explosive devices, even though the British public probably thinks he’s the one most likely to be planting them. Sometimes he longs to discover something in order to justify his asylum, but this longing is so terrible he cannot admit it even to himself. The consequences of there being something and his failing to find it are too appalling to imagine. To dread and desire the same thing: does that make him profoundly unlucky, or the most fortunate of people, the most alive?

This particular night, Dalmar is in an upbeat mood. He’s just done the check, ticked off every area on the sheet and hung the clipboard back on its hook in the Duty Team Leader’s office on Platform One. Now he’s chatting to tonight’s Customer Services Manager, a short, jovial type called Tom. Dalmar is wondering whether to apply to train in Customer Services. His English was very good even before he left home and he’s completely fluent now but he is still shy. Tom has been encouraging him. ‘Start on board, Dalmar,’ Tom has said; ‘on board is where you want to start off, it’s much busier on board. Do five years, then transfer to a station. It’s a good living, good package.’

While Tom and Dalmar talk, they drink tea from giant mugs. From time to time, unconsciously alternating, they glance at the CCTV, the new system that covers nine different areas of the station at any one time, all shown in full-colour high definition on a large flat screen. Tom takes a particular interest in the bike storage area: the theft rate always goes up in the couple of months before Christmas. Tom is a cyclist himself and feels for the owners. There’s nothing he loves more than dashing out and catching someone in the act of applying a set of bolt cutters to a bicycle lock, even though he could just put the call through to the British Transport Police offices over the road and let them handle it.