Gearteeth (#1 in the Trilogy) Preview

Chapter 2

"What do we do, Eli?"

"Oh, because I'm going to know? You're the one sneaking around with books where the infected wax poetic about themselves."

The upended tender and shattered cargo car were behind us now, with the crater of the Double T's engine in front. Broken pistons and scrap were scattered everywhere, none of which were made of silver, rendering them useless against a werewolf. The wolves were tough as hell, and they could ignore or heal damn near any wound short of decapitation unless it was inflicted with silver. Hitting one with a makeshift club would be like poking at an angry bear with a short stick to try and kill it. Only not as smart, and a bit less effective.

"Let's see . . . they get stronger and meaner the fuller the moon," Henry said.

We looked up above where Luna hung in the sky, bloated as a pale tick.

"Yeah. That's all kinds of useful."

"Damn it, Eli, I'm trying here!"

"We can always run."

"It'll chase us."

"And what'll it do if we stay still? Give us posies and ask us to the dance?"

"Um . . . good point."

The wooden planks under our feet shuddered as we started backing away. A terrible screech filled the air, and the train cars shifted behind us, metal protesting as gravity claimed its due on the angled wreck. The entwined mess crashed down into the weakened boards we'd just crossed, snapping them like rotten twigs and smashing its way deeper into the superstructure as the wreckage's weight settled. A burst of flame shot from the pit as the tender broke open on impact, sending up a geyser of burning coal and timber that pattered down. What had started as a few flickering patches of flame surged with the fresh fuel, and an inferno flared up around us.

"Did I piss on a preacher's head this morning?" I said, shaking my head in disbelief.

There was a twenty-foot gap of burning debris that cut off the escape route behind us, and an impact crater containing a werewolf in front of us. We had to step forward as the planking under our feet gave a warning crack.

"All right, so that ain't going to work so well anymore," I coughed through the acrid smoke that was clogging the air. I'd left my suit's heavy hood and respirator back on the Heaven's Grace, as there wasn't much call for it when I wasn't on chipping duty.

The blaze was spreading quickly, catching on the pitch used to waterproof the wooden boards. I heard the fire brigade out somewhere beyond the smoke, battling the blaze; I hoped they got here fast, not just for us, but for the city itself. The werewolf wasn't the greatest danger to Wardenclyffe now. An uncontrolled fire could sweep through the city, weakening its already battered structural integrity. We'd be nothing more than an artificial sun in the night sky before the city broke apart and plummeted to its fiery doom.

A strangled howl, halfway between a snarl and something more pitiful, made us jump like scared kids. Fire pushing at our backs, we crept closer to investigate. If we were going to die, we might as well face the beast as men, rather than running into the flames like frightened animals. Henry had always wanted to see one of these things up close, and I figured every man deserved a last wish before death.

The lip of the impact crater was actually steadier and safer than the planks behind us. Due to the force of the boiler's explosion, the coal in its ruptured furnace had been flung away in an arc behind it. The remaining embers in the pit had been extinguished by the steam blast washing over it, leaving the wreckage relatively fire-free. While that meant shelter from the inferno growing around us, the savage thing we saw at the bottom of the pit erased all thoughts of safety, and made sprinting through the blazing fire a tempting alternative.