The Great Zoo of China Read Online Free PDF Page B

at a vertiginous edge more than four hundred feet off the ground.
    CJ stopped dead in her tracks at the view that met her.
    ‘Goddamn . . .’ Hamish breathed.
    What lay before them was more than just a primordial landscape.
    It was a colossal valley, roughly rectangular in shape, encased by high raised rims like those of a meteor crater or volcano. But it was far larger than any meteor crater or volcano that CJ knew of. By her reckoning, this megavalley was at least ten kilometres wide and twenty kilometres long.
    And it was breathtaking.
    The central mountain dominated it, and now CJ noticed a man-made circular structure near its summit. Ringing the central mountain were several lakes and some smaller limestone peaks. The grey soupy mist that overlaid the scene gave it a mythical quality.
    CJ could make out some modern multi-storeyed buildings dotting the valley, a couple of medieval-style castles, and an elevated freeway-like ring road that swept around the inner circumference of the crater, disappearing at times into tunnels bored into its rocky walls.
    Even more impressive, however, was the network of superlong and superhigh cables from which hung slow-moving cable cars that worked their way around the megavalley.
    And soaring above all of this were the most astonishing things of all: the massive dragons, wings flapping languidly as they banked and soared.
    ‘We’re definitely not in Kansas anymore, Chipmunk,’ Hamish said. ‘This is even better than when Stephen Colbert took over from David Letterman.’
    ‘How do you build something like this?’ CJ asked.
    Wolfe appeared beside her, also staring slack-jawed at the view. ‘And without anyone knowing about it?’
    Hamish lifted his camera and took a bunch of shots. When he was done, he nodded skyward. ‘This crater’s completely open to the sky. Why don’t the dragons—or whatever they are—just fly out of here?’
    CJ turned to find their two hosts, Deputy Director Zhang and the politician, Hu Tang, watching them with knowing smiles on their faces. They had expected this reaction.
    Hu said, ‘I am sure you all have many questions. My team and I will be more than happy to answer them. Please, come this way.’

T hey were guided to a wide semicircular pit sunk into the floor of the great balcony, a large amphitheatre. It was about the same size as a tennis stadium, with raked seats angled down toward a central podium-like stage.
    Looking down on it, CJ noticed that its northward side had been removed entirely, giving spectators seated in the amphitheatre an unobstructed view of the glorious megavalley.
    As she and her party waited at the top of the amphitheatre, they were each handed a small gift pack branded with the Great Dragon Zoo of China logo.
    ‘Cool! Free stuff!’ Hamish exclaimed.
    ‘In boys’ and girls’ colours,’ CJ said drily. Her pack was pink while Hamish’s was black. And they were—
    ‘Oh my God, fanny packs,’ Aaron Perry said. ‘Hello, 1982.’
    CJ smiled. They were indeed fanny packs; the kind you wore clipped around your waist and which screamed ‘tourist’.
    And, CJ had to admit, Perry was right. They were a bit naff. That was the funny thing about China: it desperately tried to mimic the West but it often seemed to get it wrong in small, clumsy ways.
    Hamish—the hotel shampoo thief—burrowed into his fanny pack enthusiastically. ‘Okay . . . Audemars Piguet watch with Great Dragon Zoo logo: nice. Weird sunglasses with Great Dragon Zoo logo: okay. Thirty-two-megapixel Samsung digital camera with Great Dragon Zoo logo: very nice for the eager amateur. Oh, hey!’
    He extracted a Zippo lighter from his pouch, plus two Cuban cigars, all branded with the circular golden logo.
    ‘Now that’s sweet!’ He grinned at CJ. ‘Check yours out.’
    CJ looked in her pink pouch. It contained a dainty white Chanel watch with a Great Dragon Zoo logo, plus some odd-looking sunglasses and a digital camera.
    ‘No cigars in the