‘Better than being trapped inside a metal box if it gets stuck – or falls.’ Eddie checked the counter. Floor fifty-three, and still descending. He reached out to push the button for the fiftieth floor—

Another impact outside, more powerful – and the elevator car lurched as if struck. It stopped abruptly, emergency brakes shrieking against the tracks. Everyone staggered, an unprepared man falling. The display screen flashed up Mandarin warnings.

‘What does it say?’ Eddie demanded.

‘An evacuation alert. It’s telling us to get out at the next floor,’ said Cheng.

‘Well, I would if the bloody doors’d open!’ The counter had just flicked past fifty-one, but the lift was now stationary. Eddie pushed the control to open the doors, to no avail. ‘Must be between floors.’ There was a red emergency button on the panel; he stabbed repeatedly at it, but nothing happened.

‘Maybe there’s an exit in the roof?’ Cheng suggested.

‘If there is, it’ll be locked from outside. This isn’t Die Hard.’ He shoved his fingertips into the narrow gap between the doors, pulling with both hands. The space widened a little, but then the mechanism caught.

The soldiers quickly came to his assistance. With several pairs of hands hauling at them, and one man using his rifle’s barrel as a makeshift crowbar, the doors finally surrendered. A concrete beam with the number 50 stencilled above a downward-pointing chevron greeted Eddie as they opened. Below was the shaft’s blank wall – then the top of the doors to the level below.

He put down his weapons and reached into the gap between the car and the doors. A metal rod ran diagonally across the barrier: the release bar. He tugged at it. A clunk, and it shifted. He forced his hand into the gap and pulled. The doors slowly rumbled open.

Another boom shook the shaft. Eddie heard windows shatter. Right now it seemed the fortress’s blasts were only hitting the tower’s outer skin, but if they got through to the central core . . .

‘Everyone out,’ he barked. Even though he was not an officer, or even speaking the same language, the soldiers instinctively responded to his order, forming up behind Macy and Cheng. Eddie squeezed through the gap feet-first and dropped to the floor. ‘Macy, come on,’ he said, holding out his arms.

His daughter quickly emerged. He lowered her, then looked back up – to find Cheng holding out the rifle and rocket launcher. ‘What’re you doing?’ he asked in surprise.

‘You might need them,’ the student replied.

‘I need everyone out of the lift,’ he said, impatiently, taking and shouldering the weapons. ‘Move, quick!’

Cheng passed out his backpack, then clumsily worked himself through. He got halfway – then stopped. ‘Oh. Oh! I’m stuck!’ He kicked and wriggled, trying to squeeze his midsection through the gap.