‘They don’t want no one getting in, neither,’ Rico observed, wheezing a little after taking so many stairs.

‘You taken your inhaler?’ Jasmine prompted him.

Rico pulled the puffer moodily from his pocket. ‘I keep saying, it don’t work.’

‘Let me see it,’ Jicaque snapped.

Rico produced the inhaler and Jicaque extracted the little pressurised canister from the plastic housing. ‘Yes,’ he muttered, ‘that might just do.’ He delved in his pocket and pulled out a few crumbs and lumps of some silvery-white powder.

Stacy watched him suspiciously. ‘What’s that?’

‘Jicaque?’ Tom looked at him uncertainly. ‘Is that more of your magnesium?’

‘Hair elastic,’ Jicaque snapped, holding out his other hand.

Jasmine obliged him with a puzzled glance at Tom. ‘Magnesium?’

Tom nodded. ‘He powders the ends of cigarettes with the stuff. If he’s in trouble he lights up and the magnesium blinds whoever’s close by.’

‘Cool,’ said Rico happily.

Jicaque secured the white lumps to the canister with the hair elastic. ‘Now, Rico, that gum you’re chewing.’

Rico duly handed over the gum, and Jicaque used it to fix the little canister to the lock on the doors. But as he produced a disposable lighter from his pocket, Stacy snatched it away.

‘You can’t set light to that stuff!’ Stacy said, appalled. ‘That’s a pressurised container.’

Jicaque shrugged, untied a string from one of his scruffy silver braids of hair. ‘And these are locked doors. Any other suggestions?’

The grunts, the yells, the echoing thuds and crashes from the arena were getting louder and louder. Jicaque used a small gob of the gum to secure the short string to the magnesium.

‘They’re killing each other in there,’ Tom muttered.

He nodded. ‘We must act now.’ Suddenly the lighter was out of Stacy’s hand and back in Jicaque’s. He struck the flints and a flame jumped from its end. ‘Tell me Tom, have you heard of Chet Baker? Great jazz musician.’

Tom shook his head wearily. ‘Is this the time for a history lesson?’

Jicaque shook his head disapprovingly. ‘You haven’t heard a trumpet till you hear Chet speak through it.’ He paused, apparently transfixed by the smoky flame. ‘You know, jazz is a lot like life. All a matter of timing.’ He set the flame to the string, his makeshift fuse. ‘Back down the stairs, everyone.’

Tom covered his eyes as the magnesium compound flared with blinding intensity. Jicaque shooed him away down to the turn in the stairwell to join the others.

With a deafening blast, the pressurised canister exploded. The echoes of the explosion slammed around the concrete walls, ringing in Tom’s ears.

‘So much for Rico’s inhaler,’ sighed Stacy.

‘Guess it does work,’ Rico said, a slow grin spreading over his face.

Tom peered around the corner. The doors were blackened; the lock had been punched right out.

‘Now the danger truly begins,’ Jicaque murmured. ‘Who will stand with me?’