If there is one thing you know about London buses on a Saturday morning, it's that they're completely insufferable. Kris knows that, I know he bloody does. He's another man who was born and raised in England. And he also knows how I am with enclosed spaces, especially after I came back from the last case. I had claustrophobia before, but they made it all worse once they figured out who I was. They kept me in the dark so long I forgot what light even looked like.

We've been cut a bit of slack since COVID. I stopped even going into MI6 HQ, and never went back. Unprofessional, I know, but nobody else takes it seriously anymore either.

So it's been practically six years, and I get called into to actually come in because Kris desperately has to talk to me in person. I shove my case file - which is now annoyingly 200+ pages long - into a Sainsbury's bag and leave ASAP.

Why today? What could possibly be so wrong? Now I'm on the bus, there's a woman practically on top of me as she clings to the rails, and I'm praying for my journey to be over soon as the bus rolls sluggishly down the potholed road.