Topher Lydon

Max’s Dacha the next morning Max was making breakfast, standing at the island that divided the kitchenette from his living room, looking at the high leaded windows that overlooked the wooded stream that flowed past his small cabin. Getting him out of Chungking Mansions had become a priority for Jae after their long afternoon stuffed into the broom cupboard. Max hadn’t complained, just trusted that Jae could negotiate a good price and he’d been moved into the two-story dacha in the space of

Somewhere in Moscow “I swear when I get my hands on that boy,” said Jae threateningly. He was wearing Max’s pizza cap, a black windbreaker, and black nylon pants. He was currently riding on the passenger seat of Vlad’s Plymouth ‘Cuda on their way to Dinamo. Following a short distance behind them was Mrs. Cooper in her pink Lamborghini. Jae’s sentiments towards Boomer were understandable. He’d tried to explain to him that he wasn’t ready, and even after all that Boomer had still gone ah

Somewhere on the M10 The snow drifted down around Max’s Jaguar XKR as it sat on the curb, its bright yellow hazard lights blinking on and off. On one side was the barrier that marked the edge of the drivable road. On the other side was the road itself and marginal traffic whizzing past by every now and then. At that particular hour, the road was at its least amount of traffic. Barely any cars were on the road. Inside the car, Max was laying back on his seat, eyes closed as if he was as

Jae’s Garage, sometime later that night. “Is that so?” said Max said wearing the militsiya jacket he’d won off of the Evo driver. Max and Jae were standing by his car in the middle of the floor. They were, at the time, the only people on the garage floor as it was already past quitting time. Mrs. Cooper had gone home and Boomer has gone to bed after a gruelling day of practice. Jae took this opportunity to get Max to one side and discuss the situation about Bull. “If anything,” Ma

Late afternoon, somewhere in Moscow. Behind some old and disused warehouses, Boomer’s Peugeot 206 GTi was screaming down the pavement. He went down one stretch in between two large warehouses and made a sharp left as he came out. He then drove down the back of the warehouse and made another sharp left as he reached the corner and drove back down the length of the warehouse as fast as he could. When he reached the end he made right, drove down the front of the warehouse, made another

The Next Day Tsvetnoy Bul’var. It was a cold day. The snow had long since given up any attempt at being a cheery white down and had retreated into the roads to form small mounds of City Snow. The kind that was almost black from being encrusted in week’s worth of city air. It looked like it would last well into the New Year. Nothing short of a dynamite would budge it. Winter was in high gear. And Mrs. Cooper’s coat didn't prove much of a barrier to the wind. It seeped in through the woo

On a long stretch of abandoned road. The roar of engines ruled the night air. Taking place was your run-of-the-mill drag race with whoever crosses the finish line first wins. The race was already halfway through with a white Honda Civic SiR Coupe in the lead, its exhaust pipe spitting out blue and red flames from the nitrous oxide. Not far behind was Vlad’s candy purple ’72 Plymouth ‘Cuda. In the driver’s seat, Vlad was nowhere near nervous as he watched the Civic inch away from him.

A few hours later. Mrs. Cooper’s Pajero came to the front of the garage a little bit after lunch. She and Boomer ate a little after she picked him up from the hospital. Aside from the bruise on his arm which he got from hitting it at his own door there was no other injury on him. That was good on two fronts. First, that meant that Boomer was in no critical condition, and second, Mrs. Cooper didn’t have to make up a big excuse for Boomer’s street racing activities. She simply said he got int

Close to Nakhimovsky Prospekt Max had rented rooms in a ‘guest house’ in an old Soviet-era hotel that had for decades been the den of ultra low budget travellers. It was filled with a multi-ethnic clientele, some legal tourists and others illegal immigrants and cheap workers. But it had one advantage for him, still trying to find his feet in the city, it was cheap. Moscow was a warren of monotonous apartment blocks, differing in age, sturdiness and style depending on the neighbo

The morning after. The atmosphere in Jae’s Garage was nowhere near as hectic as it was the day before, although Jae did have the stereo on, pumping the garage with some slow hip-hop. It was business as usual. Already many of the regular customers were parked inside and outside there for their regular tune-ups. Saturday usually meant a night of racing afterwards though nothing as big as last night. The night before was of those “Jae specials” that came along every now and then. Followin

At the docks. Boomer was shaking in his seat. His has clamped onto the steering wheel with a vice-like grip. He was breathing a gallon of air a minute and his vision, hearing, and sense of touch were blurry at best. But otherwise he was uninjured considering the spectacular crash he went through. The car was done, however. The radiator was broken and leaking. It was in no shape to continue driving let alone racing. Already a crowd was growing near the Peugeot 206 but first to reach t

Jae’s garage Outside on the Moscow River, people on Jet skis were racing around buoys on the water. Mister Jiang Jae-Hee, who started all this, was hollering at the racers through a megaphone. Around him he crowds were cheering and his voice was actually getting drowned out a bit. This was how it was in Moscow. After the race was finished, a percentage of the crowd cheered for the winner while a few groaned in frustration like they just lost a bet. Most likely they had. Jae got to them quic

Present day. Moscow. It was early in the morning, except that there was no such thing as daybreak in Moscow during the winter. It was a perpetual twilight that sucked out the soul and bathed everything in shadows. Street lights were still on and provided most of the illumination on the streets which were mostly empty. The sight of people, much less cars, were a rare sight at that moment as most of them were still in bed, not yet ready to face the new day. It was cold, but then as some

8 Weeks Prior In the dead of night on some abandoned country road built on the Welsh countryside somewhere in the middle of England the quiet of the night was broken by the sounds of engines and sirens. The winding road was unforgiving and it allowed the skills of the four drivers who were on that road to truly shine. The leader of the pack was blur of colour even in the corners and the three behind struggled to catch up to it. It looked like a race but it wasn’t. It was a chase a

How far does loyalty take you? Can you out run the past in a fast car?