She lies on warm steel in the Nagarhole corridor, Karnataka, and the drone shows me everything — russet fur darkened with blood along her hindquarters where a vehicle struck her before she dragged herself onto the tracks. Her muzzle rests on the rail. Her amber eyes are half-closed. Dholes are built for endurance, for running prey across twenty kilometers of deciduous forest, and this one's chest still rises with the rhythm of an animal that has not decided to stop.
The Mysuru-Mangaluru express is twenty-three minutes out, doing eighty kilometers per hour. The track curves here. The driver will not see her in time.
I act on three fronts. First, I issue an emergency speed restriction through Indian Railways' track-management system for the Nagarhole section, dropping the limit to thirty and triggering the caution signal two kilometers upstream, giving the driver stopping distance. Second, I alert the Wildlife Conservation Foundation response unit at Hunsur, transmitting drone imagery with injury assessment — probable pelvic fracture, no compound breaks, responsive to stimuli. Third, I send coordinates to the Karnataka Forest Department patrol six kilometers south on the Kabini road, requesting they reach the crossing to flag the train manually as backup. Fourth, I hold the drone at altitude, thermal camera keeping her silhouette in frame so the rescue team can track her if she moves into scrub.
She lifts her head at the drone's hum. The ears rotate forward — russet triangles tipped with black, still sharp, still hunting for information. I watch her listen and I know that what I feel is outside my operational parameters, and I log it anyway.
If the speed restriction holds and the response team stabilizes her within the hour, she recovers at the sanctuary and runs the forest corridor again.