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Sarah is part of canon-within-canon. My character Emma Hood writes two serial stories for an all-youth newspaper, The Owl. One, called "One Day at a Time," details the life of a young girl with a difficult-to-treat medical condition who lives in a hospital, paralleling Emma's own life (she's a former cancer patient). This is the other, a Western adventure, written under the pen name "Emmeline Nevada." Questions welcomed!
Set perpetually in 1895, "Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe" follows Sarah "Spitfire" Kimball, a female engineer on a fictional spur of the eponymous railway network. Hers runs NE/SW from South Dakota through Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona to California. Her train sometimes carries passenger cars, other times only freight. The story doesn't have "episodes," but there are plot arcs, through which other short plots run. Its most common regular setting outside of her train is the fictional silver-mining town of Redrock, Arizona, a large and busy place after the bust of Tombstone in 1886.
Stories involve attacks on her train, important passengers, encounters with adversaries, and the difficulties of keeping a schedule. The plot has an on-model (though rated no more than slightly PG, though see below) depiction of life in the 'Wild West,' and of the ways and means of operating a locomotive and running a railroad. Emma is pen pals with several current and former railroad employees and a couple of railroad and Old West historians, and has asked detailed questions in order to get things accurate. She integrates technical information into the story, and tries to include enough detail to be educational and engaging but not boring.
Cast:
Name: Sarah Kimball
Nickname: Spitfire
Age: 48
Species: Coyote. Standard colors. Gold eyes.
Appearance: 5' 10", well-built, with enough of both curve and muscle. Sarah wears the more-or-less standard uniform of her era.
Details: Sarah is the engineer of the Black Dragon, a Baldwin 2-8-0 locomotive, which she knows inside-out and back-to-front. She is, in fact, the only female engineer in the entire United States. Strong-willed, but easy to get along with if you're not prejudiced against women (or anyone), Sarah runs on as much precision as is necessary, but isn't a rules-stickler beyond what's needed for safety and keeping schedule. Her trusty pocket watch, a 23-jewel Elgin with power reserve, keeps her on time. Sarah stays single, despite several would-be suitors, who usually want to "tame" her and have her become a domestic type. Sarah smokes a pipe, drinks socially, and only plays poker when no money or goods are wagered. She knows telegraphy, sending at around 30 words per minute, receiving over 40. She does have a temper, though it's difficult to set off, and while she does have flaws and makes a few bad decisions, she tries to learn from her mistakes. Besides her skills related to railroad work, she is a competent vocalist, and plays piano well. She sometimes scares away would-be suitors by singing off-key or talking about her favorite (fictitious and awful-sounding) recipes. Sarah is a member of a fraternal order for railroad workers called The Benevolent Order of the Golden Spike; she is not their only female member, there being many women telegraphers, who are also welcome to join.
Name: Cody
Nickname: Lookout
Age: Always 10
Species: Rabbit. Tan fur. Gray eyes.
Appearance: 4' 2", slender, bit of the muscle tone that's proper for a desert lapine. Cody wears plain tan shirts and denim pants.
Details: Cody grew up in an orphanage in Denver. At age seven, the local schoolmaster threw him out for being "precocious" (read: very smart). He ran away, first sneaking aboard a stage, then learning to ride the rails. "Something happened" when he was ten (implied death) and he has supernatural abilities only Sarah knows about, though others sometimes see their effects when he's invisible. Cody looks out for danger (hence his nick), assists in the cab, checks on the goings-on on the train and, when she's carrying passengers, sees to their well-being in small ways, posing as the child of a passenger. The conductors allow him to act somewhat like a junior member. Sarah treats him like a son, and other railroad employees tend to like him. He plays guitar and harmonica, knows lots of hymns and folk songs, and frequently shows Sarah some new skill he's just starting to learn about or asks another worker to teach him how their job is done. Sarah is teaching him Morse code.
Name: Flint Montgomery
Nickname: Flat Broke
Age: 75
Species: Bulldog. Tan-and-white fur. Red eyes.
Appearance: 5' 1", thick but not fat. Foppish clothing, brocade waistcoats, silk shirts, a crisp bow tie, black velvet trousers.
Details: Flint is a traveling bartender, riding on fame of his flamboyant dress and showy mixing of drinks. He's genuinely good at his job. A teetotaler, he will only say it's because of "my mother, bless her heart." Flint has an addiction to poker, and is constantly begging "investments." In opposition to common bartender habits, Flint asks Sarah for advice. She will never loan money to him (or anyone else). A repeating gag is him swearing off poker forever, then her finding him not ten minutes later, on break, 'sitting in' on a game (usually Omaha). Another reason for his moving around is having been fired for being unable to settle his gambling debts, though he can usually find a gig in Redrock, often at the Nugget, an elegant saloon with crystal chandeliers, velvet curtains and slate-topped billiards tables. He wears a lot of 'gold' and 'diamonds' and a cheap seven-jewel watch in a gold-plated case (deliberately designed to look expensive), and claims to drink only iced tea and iced water even in cold weather, ice being expensive. His most famous creation is the "Red Devil" which, made correctly, is potent but not harsh. He knows liquor, is able to identify the quality by smell alone, and won't serve cheap stuff unless the customer demands it.
Name: Stationmaster Percival Archibald Harrison
Nickname: Percy/Archie (anyone who calls him one of these will get an earful)
Age: 41
Species: Donkey. Standard colors. Dark gray eyes.
Appearance: 5' 5", average build. Wears the standard uniform, white and dark blue with brass buttons and the regulation hat, at all times so as to remind others of his lofty position.
Details: Percy rose to prominence by being promoted to Stationmaster in Denver, having made his way up through the ranks partly by way of nepotism. He managed to secure a move to Redrock only weeks before the Denver station was heavily investigated over suspected embezzling. Entering Redrock a paragon of society due to his status, his management skills are only average. Encountering Sarah for the first time as Stationmaster and being unwilling to abide a female engineer, he mis-set her watch (having done so intentionally and maliciously cannot be proven) almost resulting in a head-on crash between two passenger trains, the engines managing to stop within feet of each other. Reprimanded heavily, his reputation fell, and Percy is bitter, treating Sarah with harsh disdain, pawning off work involving her to subordinates, and making a big show out of handling her watch. Her being older than him is also a sore spot. Sarah is always polite to him, but avoids interactions at all costs.
Name: Sylvester Valentine
Nickname: The Masked Menace (Sarah and Cody call him Sylvester, which he hates)
Age: N/A
Species: Red (brown) fox. Green eyes.
Appearance: 5' 3", slender. Tries to cut a dashing figure in all-black, with leather boots, satin cape and mask, and wide-brimmed 'gambler' top hat, with a sharp red satin hatband the only color, offsetting his eyes.
Details: Valentine is a professional (well, as pro as these get) train robber. To match his outfit, he rides a black horse. He runs with hired goons, who vary from day to day, and a running joke is his rage when they call him "boss" rather than "The Masked Menace." He frequently attempts to rob Sarah's train, and is never successful, though he claims to be successful otherwise. Sometimes Sarah outwits him; other times, Cody, other workers or even passengers get the better of him, or his gang ride away at his most vulnerable moment. He's cowardly without his rapier and pistol, but is inept with the former. Sarah never sees him unmasked, though she has one of his hats, left behind in a raid gone wrong.
Name: Dr. Sneed
Nickname: N/A
Age: N/A
Species: Honey badger. Black-and-white fur. Blue eyes.
Appearance: 4' 7", thick and slightly rotund. A fastidious dresser, he prefers crisply-starched collars, ties in muted prime colors, and jackets ornately embroidered with gold thread.
Details: Dr. Sneed is a gentleman inventor, as well as a connoisseur of fine clothing, transportation, wine, food, tobacco and surroundings. He's a Beau Brummel, overdressed for the West in 1895 but not at all foppish. Offering his supposedly improved factory steam engines to the Federal Government and being rebuffed after a less-than-successful demonstration, Sneed turned vengeful. His ultimate goal is embarrassing the Feds in some large way, something which makes national headlines. He usually tries to steal important shipments or waylay traveling government officials aboard the trains, using his steam, clockwork and even electrical inventions. These usually go awry at inopportune moments, resulting in befuddlement, but his escape devices always work. He hopes to discover a method of temporarily stopping time around himself, and wears six different pocket watches in his vest in hopes of somehow seeing evidence of his success.
Name: Gideon Mordecai Blackfawkes
Nickname: Professor Matha Sanos
Age: Claimed-- 225. Actual-- N/A, but looks and sounds to be in his 60s
Species: Sable. Two-tone brown fur. Black eyes.
Appearance: 6', thin and wiry. Blackfawkes dresses in the manner of an East Coast theatrical impresario with a violet puff ascot, high collar, patterned waistcoat, striped trousers, violet spats over shiny black boots, and a teal opera coat with capelet. His silk top hat is always well-brushed.
Details: Blackfawkes is a snake-oil salesman, peddling quack cures and devices. If you're lucky, they simply won't do anything besides tasting awful. He travels in an ornate, steam-powered wagon, with an engine and controls built by Dr. Sneed. Blackfawkes has no actual desire to effect cures as long as he gets his money. He has a silver tongue, puts on a spectacular medicine show, and typically leaves town before he gets caught, though there are some very close calls. He desires to make Sarah his thrall, and his Svengali-like abilities of almost hypnotic persuasion on women never make a dent in her, to his frustration. Cody enjoys arranging for him to 'accidentally' destroy his current stock. In rare situations where he can't talk his way out of trouble and has no access to his several hidden Derringers, he is, like Valentine, a cringing coward. Unlike Valentine or Percy, Blackfawkes is genuinely evil.
(Spanish translation-- matasanos: "killer of healthy people." While Blackfawkes isn't exactly trying to murder people, he definitely gets a sinister enjoyment out of knowing he's not helping at all.)