Destination Unknown
Leaving Montana
Admiral Biscuit
Sweetsong flew over the yard, her eye on Main Street instead of the trains. WOK N ROLL caught her attention, and she swooped down on the sidewalk in front of the restaurant.
She knew all too well that too much Chinese food—no matter how good it smelled or tasted—would be a problem later, so she settled for a seaweed salad and an eel avocado roll, then trotted around town, looking for a good park to busk at, finally settling on the park behind the carousel building again. As much as she hated visiting the same place more than once, it seemed popular with tourists, and put her in a location where she could be seen by the patrons of Clark’s, but also Pizza Hut. It wasn’t very park-y; it featured a boxing sculpture and various informational signs explaining that a famous boxing match had once been held there, a hundred years ago.
Sweetsong only knew one boxing song and she wasn’t entirely sure it was about a boxer at all. Sometimes human songs were strange and their lyrics didn’t mean anything. But the tune was catchy and people liked it, and she wound up performing it several times through the afternoon, along with her more usual repertoire of train songs and improvised travel songs. Her fishing hat caught plenty of money, and as the sun was settling over the distant horizon, it was time to move on.
The Alibi Lounge had a Flyin’ Hawaiian pizza with nacho cheese sauce instead of normal pizza sauce which was both intriguing and proof that humans would never stop coming up with new kinds of pizza. The smallest one was more than she really needed, and if she ate it all, she wouldn’t be a Flyin’ Sweetsong, but that was okay, she could eat the rest of it tomorrow.
The flavor combo was weird and she couldn’t decide if she liked it or not. But after the leftover pizza had been boxed up she had a sudden urge to take just one more piece.
Even in the dark, the signal bridge was easy to find, and she settled into her now-familiar spot, facing her rump into the wind before draping her army blanket over herself.
•••
Sweetsong woke before the first light of dawn and looked down the tracks. All the signal lights were red; she could see that without even having to crane her neck over the walkway. But she could see dimmed headlights in the yard, and that might mean a mainline train headed in her direction soon . . . or it could mean that the yard crew was on break.
It was tempting to fly towards the yard and see what, if anything, that locomotive was coupled to, but it was smarter to stay on the signal bridge as long as she could; she was far enough out of the yard she wouldn’t be seen by anyone there, a departing train wouldn’t be moving all that fast, and the locomotive crew would be unlikely to spot her on the bridge until the sun came up.
She rolled up her army blanket and then got out a slice of cold pizza, keeping her eye on the yard.
•••
The sky was getting light; the stars were fading, and she was losing hope of catching out from the signal bridge. She’d had an eastbound train pass under her; it was still sitting in the yard, its rear light blinking.
People had been generous at the park, and she had enough money that she could take an Amtrak train to a better location. Or she could try her luck hitchhiking; she’d met an earth pony at a truck stop who did just that. You couldn’t stow away on a truck like you could a train, but you could ask and often get a ride. A few truckers had listened to her singing, and surely some of them understood the need to always be moving along.
She paced the steel walkway, her eyes constantly returning to the train that wouldn't move, and then it was moving, its headlight was bright, and its ditch lights were cycling back and forth.
It would be just her luck that it was a train of all tank cars or all coal cars, or something else she couldn't or wouldn’t get into.
Just one empty gondola, that’s all I need. Too far to tell. It crept through the yard, picking up speed, and then it was out from among all the other cars, and the very front of the train had a quartet of covered hoppers, followed by a Pan Am box car. Almost certainly a mixed freight.
Now was a delicate balancing act; she wanted to keep her eyes on the train for as long as she could, to get an idea what cars might be a possibility—she didn’t want to pass up a suitable car in the hopes that a better one might come along. The Pan Am box car had an open door, although it was much closer to the front than she’d prefer.
But as the train got closer, the risk of being spotted got higher and higher, and the crew might be watching in the rearview mirror to see what she’d do. They might see her board the train. Unless they never knew she was there. . . .
The signal heads worked to her advantage; she stepped behind it and waited as the locomotive got louder and louder, then a blast of hot exhaust washed across her belly and ruffled her feathers. If they were really attentive, they might have been looking up and spotted her, but there was nothing she could do about that. Most people didn’t instinctively look up.
Mid-train there was a gondola trailing a bulkhead flat with a tarp-wrapped load, and she kept her eye on that. The train was picking up speed faster than she wanted it to, which made grainers and box cars with open doors a riskier proposition.
Timing was everything; as the bulkhead flat passed under the bridge she had a very short run-up and then jumped off, well aware of the second bulkhead closing in on her. The train wasn’t moving too quickly, and she could almost match its speed.
The instant the rear bulkhead passed under her, she flared then dove, eyes already on her touchdown point. A brief wobble as the slipstream of the bulkhead flat caught her, and then she was between the gunnels of the gondola and then on the floor.
The floor wasn’t clean—they usually weren’t in gondolas—and she tossed a few scraps of wooden dunnage over the side, just so she wouldn’t have to worry about them flying at her if the train made a sudden stop.
If it wasn’t so much bother to carry, a broom and dustpan would be nice to get some of the grit off the floor of the car. She did the best she could with the tips of her wing, then shook some of the accumulated gravel out of her primaries. Not as good as a proper preening, but it would do for now.
The train was still accelerating as it curved around a small rise, coming close to the highway before moving away again. Gondolas were nice for their openness, but not so good for sightseeing off the side; if she poked her head up she was too visible.
The route map that the train station had, though, had suggested that soon enough they’d be back in the middle of nowhere and she could sightsee as much as she wanted. The train was going to have to go through the mountains to get to Idaho, and she didn’t think there'd be a lot of human civilization out there.
Sure enough, as soon as the train left Cut Bank, it left the road behind, meandering through fields instead. Sweetsong stuck her head up over the edge, studying the distant horizon, wondering how soon she’d see proper mountains instead of the hills and hummocks that jutted up from the undulating land.
•••
It wasn’t all that long. After another stretch along the highway, the train briefly turned away and she stuck her head up and was sure that those weren’t clouds on the horizon, but actual mountains.
She kept her ears alert, ducking down whenever she could hear nearby traffic, then popping back up cautiously whenever it was gone.
The track bent to the south and passed through a small town, and then they started climbing above the road. To the west, only hilly upslopes, covered in scrub brush, with aspens and pine trees at higher elevations.
They were headed southwest, surely working towards a pass or tunnel. The train curved around as it followed the easiest path, finally crossing over the highway and then a river and off into the wilderness.
She hooked her forelegs over the edge of the gondola and watched the trees rush by, occasionally remembering to look back in case they were being overtaken by another train.
•••
The first tunnel caught her by surprise; she’d dropped back down to the floor of the car to get a water bottle out of her saddlebags, and all of a sudden it was dark and echoey.
It was short, and a moment later, before she’d even caught her bearings, there was a second tunnel.
Back out in the open, the tracks were running alongside the road again, but there were enough trees Sweetsong didn’t think she’d be spotted. Besides all the trees and the undulating terrain, she’d wrapped her army blanket around herself as a makeshift cloak, dulling herself out.
She did duck back as she spotted the headlight of an approaching freight, tucking herself against the front of the car. They’d have a moment to spot her if they were looking right out the side, and then she’d be lost in the shifting shadows as the train passed by.
How weird would it be to be in a tunnel with a train going the other way? There were still two tracks, and that was very much a possibility. She didn’t know if there were just some short tunnels, or if she’d find herself in a long one. Sometimes railroads would tunnel through the mountain well below the peak to save curves and elevation—she’d already passed by a few spots that looked like they’d been former turnbacks, and a couple of cuts which might have once been tunnels.
Just before the end of the opposing train, the highway crossed over them and then diverged off.
They were running on a gravel embankment not far above the river, crossing a series of fan-shaped lowlands which surely flooded when the snow melted in the spring. Maybe sometimes the tracks got flooded, too, if it had been a snowy winter, and the trains would have to wait until the river levels went down. That was the risk of following a river’s easy path.
A track curved off along the riverbank and then just ended, and a moment later they passed by another switch—a wye, likely to turn around helper locomotives. Human locomotives were big and powerful and could get a train up the mountain without help; Equestrian trains sometimes needed extra locomotives to pull or push.
The land flattened out into fields, an odd thing to see in the middle of a mountain range. She ducked back below the lip of the car until they were in good tree cover again.
It was inevitable she’d see boaters on the river, and she did, both rafters and kayakers, and most of them paid the train little attention—most people were interested in the locomotives but after the first dozen or so cars passed, lost interest in the train. That was another good reason to prefer the rear half of a train to the front half.
Not all of them did, though, and she got spotted by a kayaker who raised a beer can up in salute. She did the only logical thing and waved back.
•••
The train was slowing as it passed into the tunnel mouth, and even though the tunnel was short enough she could see lights from both ends, Sweetsong wondered again what she’d do if a train stopped with her in the tunnel. She’d have to stay with her car and not panic and assume the train would get moving soon.
Then they were back out along the river again, but she could see ahead of her where the train vanished into another, and she could also see the headlight of an oncoming train on the other track.
She ducked down until the locomotives had passed, then stuck her head up again, watching the opposing train pass by, the rocks rising up, and even though she knew it was coming, she wasn’t prepared for the sudden darkness and cacophony of noise two trains made in a tunnel together, nor the shadowy blur of the other train, moving at a different speed than the rough rock wall on her other side.
Even though she instinctively knew she was safe as long as she stayed inside the gondola, with each passing second the urge to fly out to safety grew stronger. A railcar with flat wheels could be a monster stalking the cave, she swore she could hear water—what if they were under the river and the tunnel was leaking?
For once, the gondola was too open, crud was pelting against her, tossed around by the weird currents in the tunnel, and the stink of diesel exhaust covered everything else.
And then they were out and she was blinking against the sudden brightness; it had only been a few minutes but it felt like it had been hours.
Humans made rail systems that ran entirely underground and she didn’t know how they could stand that.
•••
Two more tunnels, both of them short, and then the train passed through West Glacier. Sweetsong ducked down as they went alongside a road and past the train station, then they were back into thick trees.
The sun was getting close to the top of the mountain, and she started to consider if she wanted to ride the train all night or if it would be smarter to bail out and find another train in the morning. She didn’t mind overnighting when she had a safe nest against the slope sheets of a grain car or inside a boxcar, but open gondolas were a different matter. Even at night, she might get spotted and the train could be stopped and she’d have little warning she was about to be evicted.
On another hoof, if there were any more tunnels, she might pass through them asleep, unaware, and that wasn’t a bad thing. Plus, she’d get closer to her destination, and she wouldn’t be in the wilderness out in the middle of nowhere hoping for a slow-moving freight to pass by.
The gondola wasn’t the best car to be in, but it was pretty good. If she stayed up towards the front end, if she had her blanket over her, she’d be nearly invisible. Anybody who noticed it would think it was a piece of tarp left over from the last time the car was loaded.
It was getting cold. Higher up, she’d seen snowy patches that looked fresh, and that was another disadvantage of the open car she’d picked, if it snowed it would snow on her.
On the plus side, that would make her less likely to be spotted, she’d just be a lump of leftover dunnage on the floor of the car.
Unremarkable.
She nosed open her saddlebags and got out a bag of potato chips. Crunchy and salty, the perfect aperitif. Big Bold Buffalo Blue flavor, and she wasn’t entirely sure how any of those were food, but vaguely remembered hearing about a big blue buffalo who had explored America and maybe it wasn’t flavored after him, but instead the flavor he liked.
She hadn’t expected spice, but that was a welcome taste for the cooler weather, and she ate them all then stuffed the empty sachet back in her saddlebags.
•••
Sometimes she made music for her audience and sometimes for herself. Getting out her guitar and unfolding it and tuning it maybe was overkill but it felt right, and as the train passed through a town on the end of a lake, she started playing and singing. A song for the fish, or the train, or for herself? Did it matter?
The train curved around and into forest again, and she leaned up against the front wall of her gondola and sang for the trees, for the birds and animals who watched the train pass with a mix of concern and familiarity. And as the last light faded, she folded her guitar and put it back in its case and curled up on the floor of the car, pulled her army blanket over herself, rested her head on her saddlebags, and drifted off to sleep as the sea of stars slowly drifted by overhead.