The steel cable thus connected the two adjacent train tracks diagonally over a span of 150 meters. The eastern track was used for southbound traffic into Shenzhen while the other handled northbound traffic out of Shenzhen to Guangzhou.
Six minutes away, the CRH400A rushed towards the little steel box at 400Km/hr. On the other track the CRH300, a 3rd Generation Canadian, approached its little steel box at 280 Km/hr.
Marko thumbed his phone, as Volokov floored the Audi.
Chapter 2
Moscow
Pyotr Primakov peeped over the massive shoulders of the SVR satellite guy, Babichev. They were examining the live satellite imagery coming out of Southern China. This ‘new’ capability had been restored after the launch of their state of the art satellite, Koba.
An eager analyst at the fall of Communism, Pyotr Primakov had been jerked around for two decades at various backwater postings all over Russia. So when an ‘elite’ unit from Moscow had come knocking, he had jumped blindly.
However, in the ensuing six months, his Moscow dreams had crumpled like a reversing mushroom cloud. He had realized that the SVR-SB had no authority, no funds, Peter da Great era equipment, terrible recruits and a knack of being at the wrong place at the wrong time… by design.
Still, at least he was in Moscow, not on the outskirts of Magadan spying on some Uzbek laborer levelling a pothole on the Road of Bones.
The SVR Officer, Boris Babichev couldn’t keep a straight face as Marko and Volokov fumbled with their tasks. It was 1AM in Moscow and he was about to win 5Gs. He was exultant. The towering Babichev was the antithesis of the five foot five, hundred thirty pound, Primakov.
5 large… even in roubles… was a neat sum. Could he make rent? Primakov quietly prayed to his Communist Manifesto.
To begin with, no one had expected the South China mission to get this far. In the past, Russian ops inside China had largely been hands off affairs involving local dissidents, probably Uighurs, locally sourced weapons and perhaps a Dissidents 101 guide from Moscow.
Primakov however, had felt that arming dissidents was akin to being passive aggressive. So blasé. No skin in the game. He wanted to try something different. Having served for long stretches in the bowels of the Federation, he had become intimately familiar with the Russia — China border crossings across Siberia. After further analysis he had opted for the remote Blagoveshchensk — Heihe crossing in the Far East. Primakov during his tours, had noticed that the babushkas crossing into China were rarely frisked. However, convincing Marko and Volokov on the upsides of cross dressing had been a bit challenging.
When Marko had ran back to pick up the steel box, Officer Babichev was certain he had won the 5Gs. He half expected the goons to get crushed by the trains. That right there was a parlay for another two thousand roubles.
But as insane as it seemed, Marko and Volokov had successfully placed the pieces in the right place. When Marko had thumbed his phone, Babichev had gone nuts.
“Da, da, da!!!” giggled Primakov.
“Did your clowns just complete their mission? WTF,” Babichev snarled.
“Audi is out of the radius” intoned Primakov.
“I know.”
“So what are you waiting for? Activate the shit.” cried, Primakov.
“I just can’t believe it. Those sons of….”
A red phone rang on Babichev’s desk.
Babichev answered. The call lasted about 0.044 seconds. It was the authorization. Babichev fuzzed over the controls and hit a blue knob.
The two trains were already visible to the Koba satellite. One, mellow white and fast. One sleeker, blacker and faster.
Babichev got up from his desk in disgust, grabbed Primakov by the collar and mumbled, “Next time you… creep.”
Primakov brushed off the baboon and turned back to the unfolding madness 8000 Kms away.
Chapter 3
Guangdong Province, Southern China
30 year old Zhen Zhao watched as the industrial landscape blitzed by at a rate of 400Km/hr. She wondered if she was still pretty enough. She was. She had more than enough to sustain the yellow fever epidemic sweeping the contiguous states. But her recent breakup with a co-worker had left her a nervous wreck. He, a Wang, had dumped her for a younger co-worker. Such a cliché.
As Zhen Zhao raced northwards, Wang the dumper dude, was also screaming through Guangdong province, but unlike Zhen Zhao, he was doing an earthly 280 an hour in the other direction. Zhen Zhao and Wang were ‘pilots’ for the CSR trains. Their trysts had begun innocently when they had met at a layover in Hong Kong. And then a couple of weeks later in Kunming and then again in Beijing. It had been very laissez-faire, lot of bedtime and the occasional dumpling. And then out of the blue, Wang had ended it after falling for the young trainee. To add insult to injury he had mentioned something gross involving love.
Zhen Zhao had already one upped the bastard by acing the certification tests to become a CRH400A pilot. Wang had failed it. Twice. Haha. But still, being the dumpee rather than the dumper hurt. So ever since the breakup, she had actively avoided Wang by volunteering for the unsexy Western routes like Xiamen, Kashgar and even Lhasa. All that sort of changed today.
Before starting out of Shenzhen on the new CRH400A, she had checked up on Wang’s schedule. Lo and behold the Wang was heading straight at her… in a CRH300. They were scheduled to cross twenty minutes out of Shenzhen Station. The train manifest also suggested that there was a young trainee with Wang.
As the trains headed towards each other, Zhen Zhao figured at a relative speed of 680Km/hr. and a visual range of 2 Kms, she would be spending 10.8 seconds in the presence of Wang and his shiny new girlfriend. 10.8 sec? 10.8 sec was a freakin eternity while staring at exes. Zhen Zhao pulled up the operator’s manual, a 4 incher, and proceeded to the simplified Chinese section.
“Even on our indigenously developed trains, English, French, German and Spanish come before Chinese. What’s with that?” Zhen Zhao observed causally.
A Datsun manufacturing facility followed by Isuzu whizzed by on the west.
Her co-pilot Chen Chou replied, “That’s probably the order on the Shinkansen manuals.”
Zhen Zhao ignored the comment and quickly thumbed through to the section involving speed limits. She soon figured that the CRH400A should be quite stable up to about 440Km/hr. At 440Km/hr the relative speed went up to 720Km/hr and the time share went down from 10.8 to 10.0 seconds.
“Eight tenths of a second? Sounds good enough…” mumbled Zhen Zhao as she began urging the throttle. Zhen Zhao’s CRH400A was already twenty minutes out of Shenzhen and was about to come face to face with the inferior Canadian Wang carrier. Zhen Zhao tensed and pushed the throttle further.
Chen Chou her co-pilot enamored with a bootlegged copy of Angry Birds didn’t feel the slight surge in velocity. The CRH400A was real smooth.
Connected by the ultra-strong steel cable the two little boxes lay attached to the high speed tracks. The signal from Koba the satellite, activated the boxes. The boxes were programmed to levitate and grab onto the underbelly of the trains’ first car. One of them had the scheming Zhen Zhao while the other had a smooching Mr. Wang.
10 sec
As the CRH300 came into view, Zhen Zhao leaned forward and tried to make out the contents of the oncoming train’s cockpit. In the slower Chinese railroads, passing train drivers often waved at each other as. Zhen Zhao had no intention of waving as she readied her finger.