"November 30th, 1976"
Hours passed, and James was beginning to grow both worried, and bored sitting in that siding. His crew had been gone for debriefing for almost two hours and he wanted them to come back. He winced slightly as he looked back at his boiler. Ever since they had left Killdane he's felt this strange sensation in his boiler. At first it was just a slight discomfort, nothing to scoff at, however it had grown into a pain. One that he couldn't ignore.
"I'll just sleep it off. I'm sure that'll help."
He was about to close his eyes, and he felt something hit his boiler.
"Ow! What the hell was that for?" James exclaimed, his eyes darted around and saw a boy, with rocks in hand, sitting beside him. James gritted his teeth and looked to see a soldier walking up to him.
"You! Wake up, no time to slack off and sleep." He shouted at James, "Your crew is ready and has been debriefed, they will couple you up to the gun truck shortly." The soldier began to walk away back to one of the buildings, leaving James to himself.
"Ok then.." James scoffed to himself, then a thought struck him. "Wait a minute, what's the gun truck! Hey!" He shouted "Where'd you go, I need an answer." He tried calling the soldier back but he was already gone. "Figures."
After several more minutes a truck had been placed in front of James and his crew stood nearby.
"I still can't comprehend everything." said Darrell. "I mean I worked at that complex while those monsters were held right beneath my feet. Plus this disease, which I still honestly don't quite understand mind you!"
"True to that," said Jason. "But hey we've gotten through two world wars so I'm sure we'll be fine."
"..Right." Darrell scoffed, not knowing if Jason realized how old he even was.
The two men stopped in front of the big red engine and gazed at the modifications done to him.
"This feels wrong." grumbled James. "I mean I got this giant bloody gun in front of me and who knows what else in that van behind me."
Jason chuckled "Oh come on 'Redy' I thought you'd be ready for anything."
James just rolled his eyes as Jason's laughter bellowed from the cab. Darrell just remained stone-faced. He still didn't understand what the Sudrians saw in these engines.
"They're only machines," he thought to himself. "They shouldn't really be expressing this much emotion.."
"Hey you coming?" called Jason.
Darrell looked up and nodded before clambering into the cab. James took one final look at his fellow engines before departing into the mist. He couldn't help but feel that nothing good could come from this mission. The line was cold and barren now. Not a single soul wandered the station platforms or nearby towns. The whole island felt like a ghost town. This feeling of emptiness was amplified as they passed Killdane. Darrell's mind flashed back to the day everything went to hell. The thought that he could have saved his family if he left that security room earlier plagued his mind and no matter how much he tried to tell himself there was nothing he could have done, the thoughts would only grow more intense. Darrell was brought out of his grief by the faint sound of what could only be described as crying. He peaked out from the cab and looked towards the large yard. He couldn't make out the source of the cry and thought he saw a glimpse of blue break through the mist at one point, but decided to shrug it off.
"Right, we'll stop here for the night." said one of the soldiers.
Jason nodded and slowed James to a halt. He then climbed out of the cab and opened the points leading into the small sidings. James could faintly make out the small station of Maron in the mist. He remembered the time he crashed into some tar tankers and chuckled.
"Hope you guys are okay." he thought to himself.
James soon felt steam enter his pistons and he rolled into the sidings and gave the buffers a small bump before coming to a standstill. Jason and Darrell got as comfortable as you can in a cab and everyone drifted off into a peaceful sleep.
***
"December 1st, 1976"
The next morning arrived and surprisingly everyone's spirits were high. Well as high as you can get when you know you could die a horrific and painful death at any second, but higher than normal. Jason got to work steaming up James while Darrell got out from the cab to stretch his legs. As he walked around a large spew of steam shot from James' side and all over Darrell. James chuckled menacingly.
"That's for referring to me as 'it'." he thought.
Darrell groaned and climbed back into the cab to warm up near the fire.
"Is it me or did it get colder?" Darrell asked.
"A little bit." replied Jason. "I mean it's now December so it's not a surprise it got cold."
"Fair enough."
Jason then leaned from the cab and waved his hand, signaling they were ready to go. The soldiers nodded and climbed into the van and they continued their trek towards Tidmouth. The journey continued rather uneventfully, until the faint sound of chatting was heard as they neared Wellsworth. James let out a sigh of relief when he saw Edward and Bear sitting in the yard. Jason climbed from the cab and walked towards Edward to find Charlie and Sidney in the cab.
"Well even in this situation you two can't keep from your engine can you?"
"Of course not. We decided to come check on these two during our day off. Then we started hearing noises from the branch and we knew something was up."
As the three men talked James spoke happily to his fellow engines.
"Edward! Bear! Thank goodness it's you!" exclaimed James.
"Well who else would it be?" asked Edward.
"You two don't know?"
"Know what?" Bear said as he raised his eyebrow.
"T-The monsters? You two really don't know!"
"No, we've been stuck up in the shed the past couple of days. Before that I was holding these evacuation trains along the branch and Bear here was banking Murdoch and Gordon up the hill."
"What about Henry?"
"No clue," said Bear. "The points weren't set properly and he was diverted down to Brendam. He hasn't come back since."
James' smile soon turned to a frown as the thought of Henry never being seen again built in their minds. Edward's old eyes then shot up and darted around.
"Did you hear that?" he said wearily.
"Hear...what?" asked Bear.
Suddenly a loud thump was heard emanating from the branch.
"That!" Edward cried.
Everyone looked around till the gut wrenching sound of a scream was heard echoing from the distance.
"Good god what is that!" yelled a soldier who was pointing up at the sky.
The others looked in towards the area and something rather box-like in shape was seen before crashing down straight through the wall of the goods shed setting everyone into a panic. As the dust and mist cleared they could faintly see the green paint of a diesel laying lifeless before them. Before long a massive roar echoed the area almost as if it was coming from all angles.
"Get us out of here!" called the commanding officer.
Jason wasted no time and ran back into his engine and released the brakes. James called to Edward to run and hide as they raced out of the yards and on to the mainline. James' wheels tore at the rails trying to escape the creature on his tail. The soldiers opened fire, but it did no good.
"We can't outrun this thing!" exclaimed Darrel. "It's going to catch up to us sooner or later!"
"Damnit then we'll have to try! I'm not letting these people or engines down!"
"Why does it matter? We don't need these engines! We can just hike our way to the mainland!"
"I'm not going to just leave these engines to die!"
"Yeah well I'm not going to die for these engines!" Darrell said as he turned towards the cab door.
"Hey, what do you think you're doing!?"
Darrell didn't reply and kicked open the door and leaped from the cab and into the bushes. He landed with a mighty thud as everything went dark.