The Hunters

27

Andrei Dobrev didn’t ask for a single train engine; he requested two — back to back, like a Siamese twin attached at the spine. ‘The better to power it,’ he explained.

Less than a day later, Dobrev watched with pride as the massive, red-and-black engine that he recommended lumbered up the sidetrack at the Moskva-Kazanskaya station. ‘The Lugansk 2TE116,’ he said to Jasmine. ‘The true beast of the RZD.’

‘RZD?’ Cobb inquired.

Jasmine waited until Dobrev had finished explaining.

‘It’s what they call the Russian railways,’ she simplified.

Cobb nodded and continued to watch the behemoth approach. He couldn’t help feeling that this must be what a tyrannosaurus looked like when it tried to sneak up on its prey. He glanced over at Jasmine while Dobrev continued to speak. But for some reason, she didn’t translate.

‘Well?’

‘Technical specs,’ she said. ‘I don’t quite understand.’

‘All Greek to you, eh?’ McNutt teased.

‘No,’ she clarified. ‘If it were Greek, I’d actually understand.’

‘Let’s have it anyway,’ Cobb told her.

‘All right. Let’s see. Diesel engine, fifteen-twenty millimeter gauge, three thousand horsepower at one thousand rpm—’

Cobb let out a low whistle of appreciation. That would be a very powerful dinosaur.

‘Thirty-six meters long, twenty feet high, twelve feet wide, axle weight of twenty-three tons, full weight of two hundred and seventy-six metric tons—’

‘My head hurts,’ McNutt complained.

‘Wait,’ Jasmine said. ‘He’s off the details, talking about something else now.’

Cobb waited for Jasmine to catch up. Dobrev didn’t seem to care, or even notice her translation. He seemed to be lost in his own railroad world.

‘He’s telling us what else we’ll need,’ she said, reciting the list to Cobb, who did not take notes but remembered every word she said.

Finding Dobrev a standard railroad worker’s green shirt, green pants, green cap, black belt, black boots, and orange vest was not difficult — what with all the locker rooms within the station. In fact, the whole team except Papineau was dressed that way, so as not to draw unwanted attention. The Frenchman was in one of his suits as always. Jasmine had minimized her conspicuousness by pinning her hair into a bun, wearing sunglasses, and raising her shirt collar to cover the bruises that Kadurik had given her.

The team was gathered beside the massive vintage locomotive — all except Sarah and Garcia, who had disappeared into the first train car.

‘According to Andrei,’ Jasmine said, ‘this engine was easy to obtain. The modernization of the Russian railways started around 2008, and they’ve been rolling out a thousand new locomotives a year. This vintage one was in a storage facility about an hour out of the city.’

Dobrev took a second to spit onto the track.

Cobb smiled. ‘Apparently our friend doesn’t think much of the new engines.’

‘He does not,’ Jasmine agreed. ‘“Give me this old beauty anytime,” he says. With all the new trains running around, there were plenty of these vintage engines to pick and choose from.’ Jasmine looked up at Cobb. ‘He actually knows this one in particular. He says he could take it apart and put it back together blindfolded.’

‘Good to know if we break down at night,’ McNutt said.

Cobb stared at the monstrosity. It was an ambitious claim to make, but he wouldn’t put it past Dobrev. The beast was a big, thundering mobile home on large metal wheels. Essentially rectangular with a slightly curving arched roof, it had two big rectangular windshield ‘eyes’ and a round spotlight ‘nose’. Its ‘mouth’ was a low, broad cowcatcher — a plow-like attachment that pushed rocks, debris, and occasionally an animal from the track before it could cause damage to the wheels. This was framed by two more square headlights that looked like shining dimples.

As Cobb watched, two workers approached with the special license plate Papineau had secured; a license plate, he assured them, which would allow them to go anywhere the RZD ran. Cobb was always impressed by the red tape the Frenchman seemed able to cut.

Or maybe it’s just foreign money, he thought.

Papineau signed for the plate and slipped the workers a gratuity. From their grateful expressions, the Frenchman clearly owned them for life.

Cobb stepped to the side to take in the rest of the engine’s architecture. Ten high-set, square windows, sixteen air vents, and two doors on each side. No ladders or narrow walkways along the outside. Cobb nodded with appreciation. Easy to defend, tough to attack. He was certain Dobrev had not taken that into consideration, but Cobb was pleased to see it nonetheless.

Dobrev moved forward to personally supervise the linking up with the rest of the train.

Cobb noted Jasmine’s gaze. ‘You’re watching him closely.’

She nodded with concern. ‘He’s immersed himself in the work. I’m not a psychologist, but I suspect from the tone of his voice that he’s trying to avoid thinking about what he did last night — and why he had to do it.’

‘There’s another thing, too.’

‘Oh?’

‘I bet he feels like this is his last adventure,’ Cobb guessed. ‘He, and his metal friend there, had been put out to pasture. This is his chance to prove that they still have some worth.’ Cobb watched as Dobrev instructed the younger workers on the best way to treat the locomotive. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if he had named this old girl.’

Jasmine grinned at the comment. ‘Ludmilla. He named it Ludmilla.’

Cobb smiled at the humanity of it.

That was rare in his business.