C.G. Stokes

The Haapavesi Spindle House runs through every storm, its steam-powered looms churning out coarse army wool beneath towering iron rafters. Boiler mechanic Oskari Lemmikalt likes the deafening clatter because it drowns out human conversation. But when a pressurized tallow line ruptures into a bone-ash sizing vat, the machinery spins something that was never on the production order. A spindled horror of boiled wool, tallow, and snapping drive-bands hauls itself into the overhead catwalks, hunting down the isolated night shift and sealing every fire hatch with taut, scalding thread. Armed with cutting shears and a steam-lance, Oskari must climb through the shuddering machinery to vent the central boiler before the mill becomes a slaughterhouse.

Stathios has spent thirty years keeping the rusted switching yards of Halikarnas running, surviving corrupt foremen, caustic smog, and the occasional syndicate shootout. What he did not plan for was a ten-ton occult behemoth bursting from a crude oil tanker to gorge on burning diesel. When a radical terror group detonates the city's catalytic cracking plant, they release a horde of Tar-Stalkers—viscous, armor-plated demons that drink liquid hydrocarbons and ignore bullets. Now, to prevent the surging apocalypse from reaching the central pressurized LNG fuel depot and vaporizing the metropolis, a begrudging alliance must form between a grizzled yardmaster, a ruthless syndicate hitwoman, an idealistic undercover inspector, and a panicked chief engineer. They have one option: commandeer the last armored freight locomotives, load them with fragile cryogenic traps, and drive directly into the jaws of a mechanical hell.