Mitchell wanted to strike the legendary vein of coal that would make his crew rich for generations. Instead, he stared at the mouth of the mountain and admitted he had no idea where to dig. Coal dust streaked his face. His blue coveralls hung heavy with grit. A loaded mine cart sat on the track, but every load so far had been worthless gray rock. His crew waited behind him, tired and doubtful. One miner spat and asked how many more weeks they would waste. Mitchell had no answer. The old maps his grandfather left showed the mountain, but not the vein inside it. Guessing meant digging blind. Blind digging meant empty carts and empty pay. If he picked wrong, his crew would leave. Some already talked about it. Then Mitchell remembered the machine sitting under a tarp near the tracks. He pulled the cover off. Underneath stood a heavy steel drill with a long coring bit. He had traded two months of wages for it and never trusted it. Now he had no better plan. The drill could pull a plug of rock from deep underground. That plug would show what lay below without weeks of digging. He called the crew over and set the machine's feet on solid ground. He fed hydraulic hose to the frame and started the motor. The bit spun and bit into the earth. Rock dust sprayed. Mitchell leaned in, watching the coring bit sink foot after foot. His hands ached from holding the frame steady. The first sample came up gray and dead. He moved the drill twenty paces and tried again. Gray again. His crew grew quiet. A third hole gave the same worthless plug. Mitchell wiped his face and studied the slope. Water seeped from a crack in the rock there. His grandfather always said coal ran where the ground held water. He dragged the heavy drill to the wet seam and locked the feet down. The bit chewed deep. When Mitchell hauled the core up, the plug came out black and shining. He rubbed it with his thumb. It smeared coal across his skin. Real coal, not gray rock. The crew crowded close and shouted. Mitchell drilled two more holes along the same line. Both came up black. He knelt and lined the three black cores in a row. They pointed straight into the mountain's heart, a clear path to follow. For the first time, he had a map of where the vein ran. No more digging blind. Mitchell stood and faced the dark tunnel. He had his direction now. But the black cores ran deep, far past his short track and single cart. To reach that coal, he would need to cut a shaft deeper than his crew had ever dug. And deep shafts, his grandfather warned, brought their own dangers.