Chapter 7: The Burn

The cold-soak test ran at dawn on the last day of the month, with the thermometer on the range fence reading nine below zero.

The prototype had sat in a freezer box for twelve hours.

My fingers were so stiff I could barely turn the locking screw.

The team stood behind the yellow line with their collars up.

Eamon stood closest, his clipboard under one arm and his breath smoking in the lamplight.

I started the rig.

It clacked through the first thousand cycles without a hitch.

At five thousand, the frost on the barrel had melted into beads.

At ten thousand it stopped, and not one round had hung.

The team cheered, and I stood there in my frozen coat with my hands shaking from the cold alone.

Eamon turned to face them.

"All right," he said. "I made a bet with Nine, and I'm going to pay it right now, in front of everyone."

"Say it," somebody shouted.

He opened his mouth.

At the next bench, a technician fired a test round from the second rig, and the cartridge in the chamber of our rig cooked off a half-second later.

I don't know why.

I know only that I heard a hard flat crack, and a piece of brass came off the case and spun across the bench.

Eamon grunted and grabbed his left hand with his right.

Blood ran out between his fingers and dripped on the frost.

"Back," I said.

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