"Ready?"

Stu glanced sideways at the woman who was his daughter. Lily smiled. "Anything more than...up or down?"

Stu looked up: that way lead to robot Sam, and possibly more danger. But down?! There was something about descending the stairs into the gloom below which terrified him. But down it would have to be. He needed to keep moving.

"Down," he said, with forced confidence. Lily took the opposite side of the staircase as they began to descend.

The further they went, the more the light changed. Now the grey luminescence was tinged with a strange scarlet glow, like looking into the pit of hell. Everything he had faced so far was just a practice run, he realised. He closed his eyes and swallowed hard on a lump of self-doubt. I can't do this. Admitting there was something he couldn't do was rare. But this was a game which was played for keeps, not something he could reset and merely start again. He was gambling with lives--his and Jo's and Lily's--and he didn't want to know what would happen if he lost.

"I can't do this." Out loud now. He was shivering in panic. He looked back over his shoulder, where the darkness had again advanced. Everything behind them was now black, as though the world had ceased to exist beyond the realms of where they were.

Lily moved closer to him. "You have to do it, if you want to save Jo. I can help you, but there are rules. I can't do it for you."

"I know." He forced down his panic. He had to save Jo. He could do it. He was good at what he did, so he could be good at this, too. Not being alone helped tremendously.

He pushed on, though the heat was now stifling. He undid another couple of buttons on his shirt and took another swig from the bottle of water. The cuffs were still hampering his movements, and being unable to get his wrists more than three inches apart was becoming a major inconvenience. For a moment, Stu considered the bunch of keys still in his pocket. What were the odds…? Unlikely, he decided. He was just going to have to cope.

They'd come to the yet another doorway, and Stu pushed open the door to find another corridor: long, dark, and infused with the nasty smell of damp. He had the strangest feeling of déjà vu, but steadily he limped on. Something moved up in the gloom up ahead, where he caught a tiny glimpse of something moving. He raised the gun to aim. Now there was movement all around them. He looked back at Lily; hands were reaching out to grab her and she twisted away frantically. Now they were running, the heat and the grabbing hands were all around them, and they kicked and elbowed their way through. A doorway appeared ahead of them, and Stu barrelled through it, turning to fire at the figures swamping them. Lily fell past him and he kicked the door shut.

Someone or something tackled him from behind, and they fell to the floor together. Stu strained every muscle to work himself free, but the weight on his back was heavier than him. Hands tried to drag his left arm back, which was impossible because of the cuffs. Instinctively Stu cocked his neck back hard, head-butting the person (he was certain it was a person) in the face. There was a second where he thought everything was fine as the person let go with a muttered expletive, but then a searing, white-hot pain lanced down his neck and Stu was on his hands and knees. He couldn't even scream, he was in such pain; he screwed his eyes closed and opened them again. All he could see was a blinding white light. He blinked, trying to clear his vision. It didn't work: the white flashes continued to race before his eyes. He closed his eyes again. It didn't help much.

"Stuart?" Stu recognised the new voice. Warily, he pried his eyelids open again and very slowly turned towards the speaker. The white light thinned a little and he could see the outlines of two people. He knew the smaller one was Lily...but the larger? The light slowly dissipated and peering further into the gloom, he could see Callum Stone.

"Stuart?" Callum sounded confused. Well, at least that makes two of us. Stu sat back on his heels very slowly; his neck felt as though it was going to break any second. He breathed out very carefully and tried to get to his feet. His weakening body was slow to respond, and they moved to help him.

Lily's hand was under his left elbow and he leaned in to her. Callum moved in on the other side and between them they lifted him to his feet. Stuart tried to ignore the waves of pain radiating from his entire right side.

"What the hell is going on?" Callum asked.

"Honestly? I don't know. All I know is, I have to find Jo." Stu looked at him desperately. "Please help me."

Callum nodded.

Relieved for the moment, Stu turned his mind to the problem in hand. All side rooms so far had yielded weapons and other things he could use...not to mention corpses. But the room they stood in now was different. There was a second door out, and here he didn't have to go through any disgusting pockets to find little treasures. Well, that suited him just fine. He reached out to grab the door handle and turn it. The door snatched itself out of his grasp and he threw himself to one side as flames curled through the door. It was the same sort of dark flame he had seen beneath his feet when he fell through the tarmac surface. The fire made shapes like hands reaching out to grab him, and in the split second before he kicked the door shut, he realised he could see something moving in the flames.

The silence was eerie. He drew a shaky breath. This was going to be even tougher than he thought.

"Other way." He reached out to pull the other door open. Once he got through, more hands grasped at him, but he barged his way through to the end of the corridor. Another door, and another staircase. Something made him choose the staircase, and he pushed his aching body to run it three steps at a time. He found himself in a long passageway, the strange luminescence all around him.

"Good choice, Stuart." The voice, his disembodied companion, again. "Now you have another choice to make. Behind these doors you will find the route to the next level. Choose carefully, follow your instincts....."

"What do you mean?" Stu swung round. "Choose wisely...what happens if I get it wrong?"

"If you get it wrong, Stuart, then it's game over, and Jo dies."

"NO... no...you can't do that." Stu spun round frantically. "You can't do that...help me out here...," he pleaded. "I don't know which way to go."

"Trust your instincts, Stuart." Jo's voice?

"JO...where are you?" he begged, his voice thick with tears. "Please help me."

"Your instincts, Stu. They're good. Trust your first feeling."

He closed his eyes, the tears running down his face streaking the dirt. In his mind's eye he could see Jo beckoning him. He moved forward, his eyes still closed. Now Jo's hand was guiding him; he was running on pure instinct and faith.

"The Moving Finger writes: and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it."

The stanza from the translated poem was running through his head, but he couldn't say why he was thinking of the Rubiyyat of Omar Khyyam, but it was a connection to home and that was all that mattered. He reached another door, and tentatively put his hand on the door handle. The vision he had of Jo so clear, he could almost touch her. She was through this way, he knew it. He put his hand on the handle and pushed down.

The door opened slowly, and he found himself facing another staircase. There was only one way to go: down. With Lily and Callum following, he walked down the staircase into the unknown.