being pulled my the little locomotives. The whole scene was lit by thousands of small lanterns hanging from posts of all shapes and sizes. Wooden bridges and boardwalks crisscrossed the open shaft and pit. It looked like an ant farm. Aleu realized she was in the main shaft of the Kenacot Silver mine! The Kenacot had blasted its way into the old Kennigton mine, and she had somehow worked her way into the main legitimate mine shaft.


Looking around, Aleu saw a small office built into a ledge. It was made of wood and hung prosperously over the shaft. It looked like some dark box with three large orange squares in the sides.

Looking like another worker, Aleu made her way alongside the door. And looking down the pit, shifted her vision to the door and window. The Building was empty. When the other workers where busy elsewhere, she slipped inside.  

*********************




The little office was just that…. little. It had two desks, a filing cabinet made of wood, and three gas lanterns attached to the walls. A small stove kept the room nice and warm, and a clock gave off a monotonies ticking sound as it counted the hours. Aleu noted it was almost 6:45 in the morning. Down here time seemed distant, as did the idea of daylight and nighttime.

Aleu quickly doused the lanterns, and after waiting for her eyes to adjust to the darkened lighting, started looking threw drawers and files. She found everything needed to run a mine. Receipts fro everything from wooden beams and shovels, to over thirty agriculture engines from the Merlin and Westinghouse. The desks gave little clues to the hijacking of her trains, just everyday work notes.

She was about to give up when she found a dispatchers list of every train running between Nenana and Nome. The trains that had gone missing, including her own Texas, where circled in red. Ominously, two more train that where to leave in the next week, where also circled…and most scary off all, in the next week, a passenger train was highlighted in blue.

She pocketed the list. Worried about what could happen if this wasn’t stopped. But as she put the list in the jacket pocket, she heard the door handle start to turn. As fast as a prairie dog ducking into its hole, Aleu dove under the desk she was standing at. But her miner’s helmet still sat on the other desk. Holding her breath, she pushed as far into the desk’s leg space as she could tuck herself, pulling her legs up into her arms.

The door opened and two pares of boots walked in. one of the gaslights was lit, and Aleu heard a char move in front of her desk. Luckily its occupants sat there, and didn’t bother coming behind the desk and into her hiding spot.

“How the hell did you lose those trains!” a voice said. It was rough and angry sounding.

“Well, you’re the one who didn’t want to kill the crews!” Aleu recognized that voice as Brewbaker, the mine executive.

“Well, Kaltag failed miserably with your girlfriend.” The other voice shot back. “I wouldn’t be surprised to find that she’s wondering the woods right now, looking for some telegraph office.”
 
Aleu’s heart skipped a beat, they where looking for her.

Brewbaker opened a desk. Next came the sound of a bottle opening and liquid filling a glass. He took a drink. “Don’t worry Steele, if we don’t find her, the elements will take her out on their own. There’s not even a wolf pack within sixty miles!”

Steele…the other voice was her father’s archrival. For some reasons the girl wasn’t surprised.

“You don’t sound all too happy about that.” Steele said mockingly.

“I will say I had a soft spot in my heart for the little hybrid.” He took a drink. “She would have made a lovely mate.”   

Steele laughed. “I met Aleu when she was 12. She bit me in the arm. I would only date that girl if she came with a straitjacket and a muzzle!”

It was all Aleu could do to contain her anger. But still she sat there, not even batting an eye.     

Brewbaker put the glass on the desk above her head. “I’ll be glad once we get rid of the stuff though. This train-jacking thing is really wearing on my nerves. Your buddies better be here by tomorrow night.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve worked with him for ages, he spent a while coming up with this plan and its fool proof! Balto can have his choo-choos back. We have what we really want!”

Steele stood up and walked over to the file cabinet. Aleu ducked even further into the shadows of the desk as he passed. He stopped at the cabinet opened it up, and then looked at the other desk. Silently he picked up the tin helmet and sniffed it.

“We have company.” He said ominously.

Steele kicked the desk from over Aleu, reviling her to the two dogs. The desk clattered against the wall and papers went flying.  One of the gas lanterns fell, casting a red light over the two dogs faces as they looked down at the dog-wolf.

Aleu was prepared for it, and as soon as the papers landed, she jumped up and rammed the top of her skull into Steele’s jaw. He screamed as his teeth were mashed together. One tooth cracked.

Before Brewbaker could react. Aleu charged him, slamming into him with the force of a runaway train. The two canines hit the door to the shack which broken under their weight and threw them out, tumbling, onto the ledge.

Aleu then leapt from atop Brewbaker and started sprinting for the tunnel entrance.

“Someone, stop her, thief!” Steele yelled.

A few workers made to grab Aleu as she passed, but she pushed them all aside, She actually made it to the shaft portal! But as she ran into it, she looked back at the perusing workers, and ran headlong into another dog. Before she could get a look at him, a log came crashing down atop her head. It found its mark between her ears and fell the she wolf to the floor with a thud.

Kaltag dropped the log when he had dragged from the trackside. It was the same one from Texas’s cab.

“And this time…stay down!” he hissed, spiting onto the she-wolf’s unconscious head.

You might as well be asking us to build a railroad to the moon!- US congress on the proposal of a Transcontinental Railroad.




The first thing that Aleu felt as the cobwebs cleared from her mind was a throbbing pain in her head. It was right near her left ear, and a little towards her forehead. She wanted to instantly reach up and rub her head, but found that her hands were unable to move.
The next thing that awoke her conciseness was the feeling that something soft and cloth like was wedged in her mouth, she tried to push it out, then chew on it, but to no avail.  As her mind cleared she opened her eyes and her vision returned…along with the past events of the last few hours.

She was setting atop a large crate in a long cavern. A singe track went down the center of the cavern. The same dim lanterns provided light But the cavern will full of freight.

She tried to maneuver herself but found her hands behind her back entwined with cord, the knot out of reach of her fingers and tightly knotted, her legs bound together above her knees, and her ankles the same. Her tail base was tied into her wrists, making it impossible for her to move her hands in any real direction. Her arms where bound to her sides with two lines of rope that went below and above her breasts. The soft cloth object was a band of cloth between her teeth, and another one was tied over her muzzle; she was kept very quiet. Who ever was in charge, they where not fooling around.

She glanced around the cavern, sacks and crates, pipes and machinery. She saw a fully dissembled skidder and stationary boiler. She looked down and saw a reporting list attached to the create she was sitting atop. It said that the create was full of feed and was bound for the town of Isloosa, ten miles outside Nome. There had to be over thousands of dollars worth of goods in this cavern. Each peace taken from the pirated trains. The whole of a small town economy was inside the cavern.

“I see my guest has woken.” A voice that was easily recognizable said.

Aleu swung her head around to see Brewbaker leaning against a stack of creates behind her. This revelation sent the she-wolf into a line of swarming, and muffled cusses.

“Now relax, I’m not going to hurt you, in fact you can thank me for keeping Steele from dropping you into a stone crusher!” he said holding his hand up.

“Brewbaker!” Steele’s angry voice called. “Don’t mess with the girl?”

Steele walked alongside the tracks.

“I think I can convince her to join our little group.” Brewbaker said.

As Steele emerged into the light, a smile formed under the cloth running across Aleu’s mouth, his muzzle had a brace on it! At least she had caused some damage before getting knocked out.

“Yah right…that girl is a menace. Anyway Kaltag will be here soon with the team to take the freight north to Applegate.”

Brewbaker looked back at Aleu. “She seems peaceable, and who can resist those puppy dog eyes?” he said.

Steele laughed, but his laughter wasn’t filled with joy, rather it was dry and cold. “Remember what I said about her…well right now she’s in that strait jacket. I promise you, if those cords weren’t keeping her still she would be at your throat.”  

Not far from the truth. Aleu thought.

Brewbaker nodded. And looked at the hapless she-wolf. “Shame too, after all, this wasn’t my idea. If I had my way you and I would be one rich couple.

See, Aleu, this is. Well, I hate to use the word scheme…a benefactor project. As I’m sure you are aware, the railroad is the only major lifeline running to Nome, which is the distribution center for the north. Usurping most of the work from the sled dogs. Now Steele and his sled team have been for years dropping freight off in the woods and returning to sell it at jacked up prices to the small towns of the sled routes. It was a small kickback. But with the coming of the railroad, there was