//------------------------------// // Chapter 5: Free Fall // Story: The Guild of Equestrian Railwaymen: Dual bands of steel through the hills // by bucking bronco 1968 //------------------------------// All the ponies that were in Wood Reefer’s shop quickly crowded around Me and Coal Dust as they all read through the slanderous article. “I can’t believe all of this! They’re trying to pin the whole thing on me!” I yelled as we got to the end of the article, the other rail ponies around him mumbling in agreement. Coal Dust looked over at me with concern, “What are we gonna do Stokes? They're trying to turn the nation against us!” I slammed the paper down, “We’re gonna go do our jobs is what we’re gonna do. These slanderous dirt balls are trying to get under our skins. They’re trying to throw dirt in our eyes so we can’t see what they’re cooking up. So we’re not going to give them the satisfaction. We’re gonna go walking into dispatch with our heads held high and do our job like it was any other day, mudslinging or no!” The other ponies around us cheered at my declaration, and Dusty cracked a smile, “I like the way you think Stokes.” “Well if you’re gonna do your job, you’re gonna need to stay awake. Don’t worry, I cooled them off a bit for ya.” Wood Reefer said as he hoofed over two cups to myself and Coal. The two of us quickly slammed down our coffees before making our way out of the cafe and confidently marched down to dispatch. We walked in, only to be immediately confronted by an angry Files, “Stokes, you seen this bull that’s in today’s paper?” I nodded, “Yes I read all of it earlier over at Reefer’s. But I don’t care what some nancy pantcy reporter over in Canterlot thinks about what happened that day. I know the truth, and so does the rest of the railway, and that’s all that matters in the end. Now, what’s the orders for the day?” Files smiled, “I should have known better than to worry about the two of you. Today’s gonna be an average day for you two. Just a short train of empties over to Vanhoover, and then a return train to Hoofington, before coming back with some fresh rolling stock to replace those old wooden boxcars we’ve been dealing with for years.” “The ones that are rotting out?” “Those are the ones.” Coal Dust and I laughed, “About time those things got replaced. Better get going am I right?” “Makes sense to me, here’s the paperwork for all of your runs today Stokes. Have a good one.” Files passed me the clipboard he had carried over before walking around us, destined for home. I shook me head with a smile, hoping that one day he’d get taken off the graveyard shift. I looked over the orders to find that our engine was one of the older original 2-6-0 moguls, locomotive #97. “Got one of the old Moggies again, #97 this time.” Coal Dust laughed, “I’m surprised they’re keeping that old engine in service still. She either needs to be overhauled or retired.” I laughed to as we started walking over to shed 1-17, “Yeah, but she still gets her work done without much fuss, so I’ll drive her any day of the week.” “Fair enough.” We found #97 sitting in her berth, fire built and lit, and she was building steam. “How’s she steaming today colt?” The young fire lighter looked out the cab at us, “Building pressure nice and even, just as she always does. Can always count on this old girl to start up without a complaint.” Dusty and I nodded in agreement as we took over the cab from the colt, allowing him to go off and get the next locomotive up and going. It didn't take long for #97 to build up working pressure, being a small engine and having been tended to by the fire lighter. Once the boiler had been brought up to pressure, I slowly opened the regulator and once again pulled the old engine out of the roundhouse. It was a short trip across the yard to where our train was waiting, and with the sun coming up with barely a cloud in the sky, it looked to shaping up to be a good day in the Smokey Mountains. #97 shook only slightly as I locked the couplers together, “Alright, you gonna tie the air hoses together or am I?” Coal rolled his eyes, “I’ll get it, it’s gonna be a long day hoof firing this thing, so I might as well stretch out now.” he said as he climbed down out of the cab. It wasn’t long before he climbed back in, and we were ready to roll out. “Alright, road is ours, couplers are locked, hoses are tied, and pressure is good, you ready to roll Dusty?” Dusty leaned on his shovel with a smile, “More than ready, it’s gonna feel good to be back at it.” I couldn’t help but smile, “I couldn’t agree more.” With that, I pulled open the regulator and brought the train into motion. An hour later we were two thirds of the way up the Tall Tale side of The Grade, and were running strong. Coal Dust had been more than able to keep up with #97’s appetite, as she was only a small engine. We were just coming around one of the many curves in the line when the second to last signal before the summit came into view, only to find that it was shining yellow. “Slow signal coming up Stokes.” Coal Dust said, being the first one to catch sight of the signal as I was busy checking the brake gauges. I picked my head up and caught sight of the signal immediately, “Oh, train’s on the summit? Damn, I was hoping to fly right through. Oh well, bringing her down to 25.” I closed the regulator and let the engine coast, slowly letting the gradient slow us down from 40 mph to 25, preparing myself to see a red signal adorning the final signal before the single track junction. I stopped us right outside Hazzard’s signal box, who waved to us through the window. His day had just started, having taken over from the night shift signalpony only an hour or so earlier. It was about a fifteen minute wait before the train that was occupying the single track came into view. It was barely doing 30 mph, and as it passed by I noticed that it was one of Crystal Northern’s new 2-10-4’s pulling a long string of hoppers loaded down with hundreds of tons of coal. While the Mammoth class handled the majority of the bulk freight runs to Canterlot, some were still sent through us, plus the Crystal Empire shipped raw materials to more places than just the capital. Seeing the Crystal Northern engine outside Vanhoover wasn't too much of a surprise, as sometimes a locomotive couldn't be freed up to take the train over The Grade, so the CN engines would just be waved through to Tall Tale. “That's not a normal slow goods.” I commented to Coal Dust over the sounds of the passing freight. Coal Dust then seemed to have a moment of realization, “Oh yeah that's right. They've had a slow order over the bridge for the last few days. They're fixing that problem with the sunken rails. It should have said so in our orders.” I pulled up the clipboard that had our orders on it and flipped through the pages, “Eh, nope. Nothing about the slow order.” “Huh, they must be finishing up today.” Coal muttered as the caboose passed by us. While that seemed kinda weird to me, I just chocked it up to a communication error back at dispatch, that did happen once and awhile. Seconds later we heard the switch clang and the signal dropped. “Well at least that's one less thing to worry about.” I said as I opened the regulator again and started us moving. The slow order had us restricted to 15 mph once we had gotten onto the single track, but that didn't bother us too much. As we approached the Dragon Tooth River bridge, we saw the work ponies scramble off it. Most of the work they did occurred during the night , but to stay on schedule, they had to as much work as they could between the daytime traffic. The bridge creaked under us as we crossed, but she held our weight just fine, and soon enough we were coasting down the Vanhoover side of The Grade. We rolled into Vanhoover without a problem, and left our train on the incoming line before heading off into the yard to collect our returning freight. It was a train made up of mostly the old wooden boxcars that were soon to be replaced, but mixed in were sets of long metal gondolas loaded down with scrap metal. Before we left to hit the line again, I stopped in Semaphore's office. “Hey Sem.” I said as I walked in. Semaphore looked up from his paperwork and smiled my way, “Ah Stokes! Good to finally see you again! Word along the rails is you had the honors of driving a Mammoth the other day. That true?” I couldn't help but smile, even for the engineers who got the privilege of driving the HG-10’s and TT-8’s, driving a Mammoth class would have been a dream come true. “That I did. Me, Smoke Box, and that new colt Fire Box drove #898 from the Empire all the way to Canterlot. That's a run I'll never forget.” Semaphore let out a soft chuckle, “I'm sure you won't. Just don't tell too many of the others, they might get jealous.” I had to laugh at that, “They've been jealous of me since the day I was born, so what would be different.” That got a laugh out of the both of us. As I turned to leave though, Sem spoke up again, “Oh, and by the way, word just came in. Slow order on the summit got lifted, back to normal running.” I smiled, that was just the kind of news I wanted to hear, “Perfect. Alright Sem, I'll let you get back to work. Have a good one!” “You too Stokes!” Semaphore yelled back as I walked out. I walked back over to where #97 was sitting, and climbed back into the cab, “Summit slow order got lifted Dusty.” I said as I retook my seat. “Sweet! Quick run to Hoofington!” Coal Dust cheered. I couldn't help but laugh as I released the brakes and cracked open the regulator. It was an uneventful run up the Vanhoover hills, and we were soon hitting the single track. Sure enough, the slow order boards were gone, leaving the summit open to speed. I grinned as I pulled the regulator wide open, we had lost a lot of speed on the climb up Nightmare thanks to the weight of the gondolas, and I wanted to make up the time we had lost as a result. By the time Dragon Tooth came into view, we were cutting up the rails at a cool 60mph, and I was still pushing for a little more. But, as the bridge grew closer, I noticed a sign sitting right next to the tracks, but the writing was too small for me to read. It wasn't until we were right on top of it was I able to make out what it said, and the words sent a chill up my spine. It was the slow order, sitting right at the entrance to the bridge. My eyes quickly shot along the tracks of the bridge, until I saw a sight that would end up giving me nightmares for years to come. The right rail was sunk into the ties of the bridge, almost like the work that had been done on it had never even happened. I panicked, slamming the regulator shut and put the brakes on as hard as I could. I knew I had no chance of stopping in time, but I had to try. Sure enough, I was right. #97 hit the bad section of track, and violently tipped to the right, throwing Coal Dust into me. We heard the right connecting rod smack the ties four times before the old abused bolts sheared off and the rods were ripped right out of the back of the piston. #97 continues to tip as we heard ties start to snap, I knew what we had to do. “Coal, bail!” I called. Coal Dust nodded, and without a second thought we jumped out of the cab. And over the side of the bridge. It had been a long time since I had last jumped from the Dragon Tooth bridge with my high school friends, and I had almost forgotten the almost alien feeling that came from falling through the air. The ground quickly grew closer, and I was to preoccupied with making sure I landed correctly that I didn't even hear #97 tip over the side of the bridge and fall right behind us, taking a section of ties with it. Just before I hit the water, I took as big of a breath as I could, and the next thing I knew I was surrounded by the cool rushing water. I recovered quick as I always did, but before I could start swimming to the surface, I was pushed downstream by the force of #97 hitting the water right behind me and her boiler blowing out as the metal twisted from the cold water. Again, I recovered quick and swam for the surface, popping up just as the air in my lungs gave out. I gasped for fresh air as I bobbed up and down in the water; hearing the same not to far away from me, signaling that Coal was also alright. “Coal, you good?” I asked as I finally got my breath back. “Yup.” Was all I got in reply. I turned up to look at the bridge, and was shocked to see a massive gap in the ties that had been made by #97. The worrying thing was the fact that the rails themselves had held, which meant the safety system that switched the signals to red if a rail gave out wouldn't have tripped. I quickly started swimming for shore, “Come on Coal! We gotta warn Hazzard about the bridge before he slings another train over the summit!” Coal Dust, having finally recovered, nodded and swam after me. What we didn't know was that the entire train had not followed #97 over the side of the bridge. To this day we still don't know how, but by sheer luck, or more precisely bad luck, only the first five box cars had actually plunged over the side with us. This left almost a mile worth of train, headed by a string of seven of the heavy gondolas, hurtling down the main without an engine. What's worse, was we hadn't taken on a caboose in Vanhoover, as it was deemed that we didn't need one. How they had enough speed after the heavy braking and the jolt from the engine going over the bridge to cover the last seven miles to the Tall Tale grade is another unknown to us, but they did. Hazzard was busy filling out his time tables in his signal box when he heard the sound of freight cars passing, which he found odd as he hadn't heard an engine. He looked out the windows of his box, to find our engineless train gliding past at around 10 mph. Before he could react though, they had already passed and were picking up speed as they started the downgrade. Hazard jumped to set all the signals in his block to red, but hesitated. He knew that the afternoon return express was still inside his block, and if he set a signal ahead of it to red, that my train could catch up to it and slam right into the back. It could end up as a massive loss of life. Against his gut feeling, Hazard only set the last two signals in his block to red, and the third to yellow, before jumping over to the telegram machine at the back of the signal box and typing out a message. *Code red, Stop. Engineless train loose on the Tall Tale Grade, Stop. Keep all traffic off the summit, Stop.* Having done everything in his power, Hazard sat back to do the only two things had could, wait and pray. Just over 20 minutes later, Me and Coal Dust came bursting into Hazard's box out of breath. Somehow we had been able to cover the seven miles from the Dragon Tooth Bridge to his signal box in under half and hour. He turned to us with a look of shock, before asking, “Stokes, Dusty, what the hell is going on? Why did your train go past my box without an engine?” “What!” Coal and I both yelled in shock. It was the first we had heard of the runaway. “Your train went past my box almost half and hour ago at like 10 mph and you weren't attached. What’s going on?” “The bridge gave out under #97. She toppled over the side and we had to jump. How didn't the whole train follow her over?” I said in shock. Hazard shook his head, unable to answer but glad he had ordered a halt of all traffic going over the summit, “I really don't know, but somehow it did. And now it's loose on the main and following behind the afternoon return express.” Almost all the color drained from mine and Coal Dust’s faces when we heard that. But before we could say anything, a distant boom rattled it’s way through the mountains. “The hell was that?” Coal Dust asked, almost afraid of an answer. Hazard went to respond, but was interrupted by the sound of something clanking behind him. “Well whatever it was, it broke a rail down mountain, my signals just switched to red. Wait a second, north and south bound tracks are red!” That scared us all, if the safety system had been tripped on both the northbound and southbound tracks, that meant we had a major disaster on our hooves. “Come on, we gotta go find out what's wrong!” Hazard called as he ran outside. With no time given to question, Dusty and I quickly followed. Me and Hazard jumped in the front of Hazard's speeder, while Coal Dust gave us a push to get us rolling before Hazard started up the engine. We tore down the tracks as fast as the speeder would go, Hazard counting the signals as he went. He knew his block better than anypony, it was kinda his job, and he knew exactly where the safety system had been tripped. Now, something you ponies need to understand is that up in the Smokey’s, we run a backwards north south system. What I mean by that is that on most railways, the right most track is the northbound track, with the left most bringing south bound. It's the same with east and west, with right being west and left being east. But on the mountain, we run the Northbound track on the left, and southbound on the right. We do this to give the engineer, who almost always sits on the right, the best visibility possible while hugging the mountain side. Now I can hear some of you asking, 'If your northbound track is the left track, how did Ash Pan pull up on your left during the 3800 incident?’ Well, on that day, once we had passed the last southbound train, we got switched onto the southbound track to use the mountainside to keep us out of the rain as much as possible. Whole lotta good that did us. But anyways, we got to the last signal before the safety trip, and Hazard put on the brakes, bringing us down to a crawl. We krept down the line, until we got to a sharp blind corner, “Look!” Coal pointed out. We had found the safety trip. The outside rail of the southbound track had been pushed out of place and fallen over. But that was nothing compared to what the Northbound track looked like. The inside rail looked much like the outside southbound, but the outside had been completely snapped, with both sides hanging over the side of the mountain. I was off the speeder before Hazard even brought it to a stop, and ran to the edge of the mountain. When I looked down the mountain, I was greeted by a horror show. Sitting 300 feet down the mountain on a flat outcropping, was a miniature mountain of twisted steel and splintered wood. I looked on in horrored awe, there just seemed to be too much wood to have come from my train alone, and I was right. “Guys, I think there's an engine down there!” I called to Hazard and Coal Dust, having caught sight of what looked like a cab roof mixed in the the mountain of wreckage. I didn't give them time to respond as I took off down the mountain, stumbling in the loose dirt of the steep downhill. I made it down to the bottom first, obviously, and quickly started to search for the engine I swore I saw. I found it soon enough, and had to stop in shock when I saw it. The engine was the Crystal Northern 2-10-4 I had seen earlier that day, but it was in much worse shape that it had been when I first saw it. The cab and boiler were dented and crushed from the roll down the hill, and one of the gondolas that had been in my train was speared through the boiler just above the wheels, right at the dividing line between the boiler and smoke box. Knowing that there was a crew mixed in with all that mess, sent me into overdrive as I ran to the crushed cab. But, just as I had feared when I saw the engine, the crew was not in the cab, which was now open to the wind as the tender had been ripped off and was laying in a heap not to far away. “There is an engine down here! But the crew’s gone!” I yelled to Dusty and Hazard, who had just reached the wreck site. They didn't ask questions as they began to scour the area for the missing crew. I was about to join them when I heard a groan come from the direction of the tender. I thought I had just been hearing things things, when I heard the groan again. I ran over to the tender, “Is anyone there?!” I called as I walked around the tender. “St-stokes? That you?” I heard as voice ask from inside the tender itself. I looked in, and found Ash Pan half buried under the remaining coal in the tender. “Ash!” I said in panic as questions buzzed in my head, the main one being, what was Ash Pan doing on a Cyrstal Northern train? “What are you doing here?” I asked as I unburied the top half of his body. “Fire pony for the train was sick as a dog, I offered to take the return trip for him.” Ash said weakly. That made sense, Ash Pan was often the one who volunteered to replace engineers and fire ponies if the need arose. His head then picked up, “ Wait, where's Crystal Shard? He, he was right in front of me before everything went black.” So, I had the engineer's name, but we still didn't know where he was, “Ash, what happened?” “We were just coming up the mountain, and then all of the sudden Crystal Shard yelled 'get down!’ and shoved me into the tender. Then everything went black, and I'm waking up like this. Stokes, where is Crystal Shard?” “I don't know Ash, but I'll find him, don't you worry.” I got up and went to exit the tender, “I'm gonna go look for Crystal Shard, you gonna be alright?” “Don't worry Stokes, I'll…. I'll be fine.” Ash said between a heavy cough. Though Ash Pan said he'd be fine, the blood he coughed up said otherwise. I just nodded, then made my way out of the tender. I had barely walked five steps away before I heard Coal Dust yell, “Stokes, get over here!” I ran to where I heard Coal Dust's voice, and found him and Hazard staring into the scrap pile. Before I could ask him what he was looking at, he just pointed. The sight I saw when I followed where his hoof was pointing is one that haunts my nightmares to this day, and probably will till the end of my life. We had found Crystal Shard. I cannot, and will not fully describe the sight that met my eyes when they laid upon the engineer, it was without a doubt that he was no longer among us. The three of us took our caps off out of respect for the lost brother of the rails, nothing was said, nothing needed to be said. When we finally snapped back to reality, I turned to Hazard, “Hazard, go radio Tall Tale, get someone, anyone out here.” Hazard nodded, before making his trek back up the mountain. Coal then turned to me, “I hope the fire pony is alright.” Coal said, but I could tell he didn't believe in his own words. “It was Ash Pan, he took over for the fire pony from the Empire back in Tall Tale. He's alive, back in the tender.” Coal Dust's eyes snapped open, “Ash!” He yelled before taking off towards the tender in a panic. I couldn't blame him, Ash was his brother after all. I looked back at where Crystal Shard laid, and sent a quick prayer up to Faust to take care of him, before following after Coal Dust. I found him helping a wincing Ash out of the tender. It was then Hazard came running up to us, “Tall Tale knows, they're sending up the wreckers. All we can do now is wait.” It would be nearly two hours before the salvage crew arrived, and with there help, we got Ash Pan up the hill. I couldn't bring myself to look as they went and recovered Crystal Shard, I had already seen too much. Soon enough, we were making our way back to Tall Tale, the swaying of the coach being our only remedy to our stirring minds. As I sat there in my seat, I couldn't help but run over every bit of the day's events, things just weren't adding up. “It just doesn't make sense.” I said to myself aloud. “What doesn't?” Coal dust asked from further back in the coach. He was the only one in there with me, as Hazzard had to return to his signal box to help the other signal operators figure out what to do with the trains that were still on The Grade and could no longer cross. I sighed, “All of today. Finishing today or not, that slow order should have been listed in our orders. Then we get down to Vanhoover and get told that the slow order was lifted, but the board at the bridge is still up. What's more, is it looked like no work had been done to the bridge at all. It just doesn't make any sense.” Coal Dust just turned to look back at the coach Ash Pan was riding in, “I don't know what to tell you Stokes, I really don't.” The rest of the ride was silent, both me and Dusty lost in thought. We pulled into Tall Tale not long after, with a cavalcade of ponies waiting to help Ash. As they helped the badly injured fire pony, me and Coal Dust disembarked the train ourselves. No pony asked us anything, they just gave us the room we needed. With nothing left for us to do, we quietly walked to our bunks, where a restless night awaited us. The next day Coal Dust went and checked on Ash Pan. He was in bad shape, but he'd pull through. I couldn't bring myself to leave my bunk, I was too lost in my thoughts. I just kept running that day over and over again in my head. I kept looking for some fault in my actions, something that would point to why this all happened, but I just couldn't find one. Night came quick, and I pulled myself back into bed, for another restless night. The last thought that went through me head before I finally passed out from exhaustion at 2 in the morning was, “I'm the reason somepony isn't at home tonight.”