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at but a monster that wanted to kill her, fired the gun.
She missed.
*****************
Balto leaned from the cab of the locomotive as she raced backwards. Smoke flying from her stack as if it was a streamer attached to a dancer. The wheels galloped along as the flames from the firebox licked the rear drive wheels.
Balto felt a hand on his shoulder. Turning he saw Dusty holding a coal shovel. With a wink she gave his a Winchester rifle. “It’s got rubber bullets, so be careful”
Balto nodded, then holding onto the grab irons as the locomotive turned into the mill complex, he dropped down to the ground.
*************
Kodi was suddenly on top of her, Aleu felt his body on top of hers, pinning her arms to her sides. He put his hands around her neck and started to close. Aleu coughed and wheezed.
“That’s what it feels like, the railroad slowly closing its tendrils around your life, squeezing it!” Kodi grunted, watching Aleu gasp for air.
He grabbed her muzzle and laughed. “Don’t worry, I won’t kill you. I’ll just awaken you to the reality!” he said. Suddenly Aleu realized what he was doing. One bite and his rabid mind would be transferred to her. Outside she heard the sound of a passing train
“Don’t worry my dear Aleu, it will just burn in your soul forever! Just one kiss is all you need.”
She couldn’t pull her head away with him holding her muzzle, she couldn’t scream with it clamped shut. She could just watch as his lips neared hers.
Suddenly Kodi screamed as a shot echoed around the mill. He fell to the side releasing her.
Aleu rolled out and took a deep breath.
Suddenly the large door blasted in as the wood it was made of splinted and shattered. A WRR 2-6-0 Mogul came screeching into the building, smoke and steam blasting out the stack. Balto at the throttle. Aleu recognized the engineer as Kirby, the dog Balto was speaking with when she first arrived, and Dusty as the locomotive’s fireman. Dusty held a rifle and gave Kodi another shot in the back.
Then threw the other door, in came the poise the dispatcher had sent after the emergency train left Nome. They quickly gathered around Kodi and started binding his hands with rope, a quick run to the hospital would save his life.
Kirby jumped down from the locomotive and lifted Aleu into his arms, her vision was fading but she was able to wheeze one question before her vision faded and she drifted into dream world.
“Who fired the first shot.”?
Kirby laughed and pointed up. Balto was running down a spiral e staircase from the catwalk above. Holding the riffle he nodded. “Rubber bullets.”
Aleu looked at him dumbly. “You make one heck of a father. Shooting you own son in the back with rubber bullets and letting her daughter freeze to death” And then dropped off completely.
A Dog cannot make this journey alone, but maybe a Wolf can
The Twinkling sun shined across the snowy fields outside on Nome. The fresh snow seemed to glinted and sparkle under the onslaught of the retreating light.
In the town, shops where closing and people where sturing about, preparing for the close of the day. But one last show would come upon this frozen oases of a town.
"Boom!" went the clock in the big yard-tower, and far away one could hear a full, vibrating twinge echo down the icy rails that split threw Nome. Then with a blast of a steam whistle and a headlight twinkled on the horizon like a star, grew an overpowering blaze, and whooped up the humming track to the roaring music of a happy giant's song:
The 4-4-0 on the head of the train looked unbelievably splendid. His big box headlamp reflecting along the tracks, the nameplates that spelled in brass letters, newly whipped, read: TEXAS. A superb eight-wheel-coupled racing-locomotive, who hauled the pride and glory of the Alaska road - the gilt-edged “Serum Special”, the millionaires' West-bound express, laying the miles over his shoulder as a man peels a shaving from a soft board. The last defiant blast of the whistle was delivered a mile and a half before the town. The rest was a blur of maroon enamel, a bar of white light from the electrics in the cars, and a flicker of nickel-plated hand-rail on the rear platform as he slid into Nome with the grace of a wolf sliding up to its pray.
Balto watched from the platform as the 4-4-0 released steam from between its wheels and ground to a halt. The light and dark brown hybrid walked over to the cab stirrups and looked into the cab.
“You did wonderful Rosie!” Aleu exclaimed. She stood next to the Engineer’s seat, the 12-year-old girl with red hair looked like a mix of fear and pure exuberating! She looked at the she wolf and smiled.
“Thatwassoawsome!” she said without a single space in her words, jumping excitedly. As Rosie leapt from the cab Balto couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Well I did promise her.” Aleu said. Balto helped his daughter dismount the cab. “By the way dad, I love the new pilot!”
Texas stood proud with his new horizontal strap pilot. Its straps, although clogged in a few spots with snow, giving quite the contrast to the two black lines sticking out of the pure white he rode upon.
It had been two weeks since Aleu and Kodi fought. Despite the pushing of several insurance companies and the loss of freight revenue, The WOLF intervened with the case of the “Northern Scandal” and clamed Kodi had formed his plans and carried them out bases on the knowledge and false information fed to him by the already dead Steele and his rabid mind. Balto had watched with sullen eyes as his son was loaded aboard a baggage car to be sent south and east to a mental institution where they where working on a cure for the disease. Jenna had also gone along to make sure their son was treated farley, the whole affair was paid for by the WOLF Railroad and Navigation Company.
Aleu spent another week in the hospital till the doctor handed back to her the brake handles to Texas. She had found him steamed up in the yard, a new pilot, stack, and paint job.
After picking up her father Aleu brought Texas and the empty coaches over to the wye to turn the whole train. The Aurora Borealis started to stretch and sparkle above them. The wye’s two legs ran over the rocky beach and past the beached trawler Balto had lived in for so long. Texas’s smoke, tinged purple against the red and blue sky drifted out over the boat. The Bering sea looked beautifully splendid from the cab windows.
“How long are you planning on staying?” Balto asked.
“I don’t know.” Aleu answered and smiled.
The Texas backed to the furthest leg and stopped. Balto got down from the cab and threw the switch, with a wave of his hand, the blast of the whistle echoed across the Alaskan town which has seen so much, Texas’s giant wheels rolled and he started back towards the depot, facing the opposite way with his train which was being cleaned and prepared.
Balto climbed into the cab as the locomotive passed.
“How about for another few months?” He said. “If you want to.”
Aleu looked at her father, one hand holding onto the bell cord. “If I want to?”
Balto looked out the cab window. “Your not my little baby anymore. You can do what you want.”
Aleu smiled. “Oh papa, I’ll always be your baby.”
Aleu caught the small twinge of a sly smile on Balto’s face as he looked at the setting sun. The tolling bell sounded above them as the Locomotive rocked down Main Street, the headlamp reflecting off the store windows. Balto looked into the empty rooms of the local hospital as the train passed, he remembered years ago looking into that window and wondering how long Rosie could hold out under the onslaught diphtheria.
Then with a blast of his whistle, Texas set out under the Northern Lights, accompanied by the sound of the wail of steam under a whistle, the cacophony of wheels on rails, and leaving a beautiful trail of orange and purple smoke behind him, reaching for the light above.
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