//------------------------------// // Chapter 10: Colt With A Train // Story: The Guild of Equestrian Railwaymen: Dual bands of steel through the hills // by bucking bronco 1968 //------------------------------// I couldn’t believe my eyes. Myself and all the other rail ponies back in Tall Tale had given my grandfather up for dead after being missing for 19 years. But here he was, standing right next to me, dressed up like some highly dangerous criminal. It was then Hotbox looked over his shoulder and smiled at me, “Nice to see you too Stokey. Got yourself in a bit of a pinch her huh?” It was at that moment Twilight chose to speak up again, “Hotbox here has first hoof experience in this exact situation of false accusations leveled by Blueblood for his financial gain.” Finally, Princess Celestia was able to recover enough to speak, “Elaborate.” “I can take it from here Miss Twilight.” Hotbox said as the two guards that had been escorting him finished up uncuffing him and stepped away to stand next to the bailiff. Hotbox moved his hooves around a little bit, before returning his attention back to Celestia, “About, 19 years ago, I was sitting at home, enjoying my morning coffee and preparing for my day. My wife had left a few minutes earlier so she could get to her classroom on time and prepare for her day herself. I was about to make the walk over to the rail yard when I heard a knock on the front door, and a pony on the other side say that they were with the Royal Guard. So I opened up the door and found, oh something like 14 guards standing outside my home. One of them asked if I was, well me, and then said that I was under arrest for High Treason against the crown. I knew nothing good would come from arguing with them, so I simply asked them if I could let the railway know that I wouldn’t be able to make it in that day, and then I’d be more than happy to come with them. I turned back into my house to write Bulkhead a letter, and that was when they barged in after me. Bumped me around a little before dragging me out, but it didn't bother me all that much. I had played hoofball in my younger days, and had seen my fair share of scrapes while working on the railroad, so no harm no foul if you ask me. Anyways, I got hauled over here to Canterlot and thrown in a lonely box, or solitary if you want to be fancy. Been there ever since.” I felt like was going to either shutdown due to my brain giving out, or blow my top in anger. My grandfather was alive, he had been for all these years, and he had been rotting away in some lonely prison cell for something he had never done thanks to the same pony who had tried to do it with me. My anger subsided a little bit when I caught sight of the look of complete confusion on Princess Celestia’s face. “That doesn’t make sense. An accusation of high treason requires a trial presided over by both my sister and myself, and must be carried out within two weeks of the accused being detained.” She said as she continued to try and comprehend what she was being told. “But such a trial hasn’t happened in nearly 150 years.” The grin on Twilight’s face grew into a confident smirk, “157 to be exact your Highness. But that’s because Hotbox never went on trial.” A silent gasp when up among the crowd in the courtroom, and Princess Celestia’s confused look only deepened, “Is that true Hotbox?” The old stallion nodded, “Indeed it is your Majesty. Spend those years waiting for my trial to happen. Then next thing I know my grandson is beating me to it. Always were an overachiever weren’t ya Stokey.” A much needed light laugh went up among the ponies from Tall Tale. Celestia, however, did not share in the amusement, “That shouldn’t be possible. We have systems set in place to keep track of prisoners who haven’t gone to trial yet to prevent these exact situations.” Twilight stepped up to stand next to Hotbox again, “That may be true your Highness. But after looking into this situation, myself and my team that I put together to assist me with gathering information for the trial discovered that several of the guards in charge of the solitary confinement wing at the Canterhorn Correctional Facility were receiving payments from an external source. These guards just so happened to be the ones in charge of the inmate records, and they were being paid to keep Hotbox’s name off of the records. That’s how they were able to keep Hotbox locked away in solitary confinement for nearly two decades with the crown being none the wiser. When we noticed this, and followed the paper trail that was left behind, you may not be surprised to find that we were lead straight to the estate of Prince Blueblood.” It took all of three seconds for every eye in the courtroom to turn and focus on Blueblood, including Princess Celestia herself. “Is that so.” Celestia said, her voice cold and even. But Twilight wasn’t done, “And that wasn’t all.” she said, redirecting attention back to herself, “Once we noticed this trail leading to Blueblood and the Tall Tale railroad, we started to dig deeper. We found that not long after Blueblood and his fellow nobles took control of the railroad and integrated it into the Celestial Pacific, it began to fall into a state of disrepair. In some areas it even fell behind national regulations. To give an example, for the 30 years that the Tall Tale Mountain Short Line was in operation, even with the few advances in railway safety at its beginning, only had a total of 63 accidents that resulted in notable damage to rolling stock with only 27 of those being fatal. That may seem high to those who are not very versed in the nation’s railroad, but when you compare those numbers to the national averages for the time period, they are nearly two times lower than those averages. In fact, the short line was identified among the top three safest railroads in the entire nation, and in the top ten of all of Equis. Additionally, in the decade prior to the absorption into the Celestial Pacific, the Tall Tale Mountain Short Line only had seven accidents on record that resulted in rolling stock damage, with only two of these being fatal.” Hearing that made me feel a pain in my heart, knowing that one of those two accidents had been the one that took away my father. Even as I thought about another lost member of my family, Twilight continued, “Why do I bring all of this up? Because, in the four years that the railway has been a part of the Celestial Pacific, there have been 85 accidents resulting in rolling stock damage, with 31 of them being fatal. Some of those accidents even resulting in passenger fatalities, and that doesn’t even include the injuries and deaths that have occurred on the maintenance side of the railroad.” That stung all of us from Tall Tale. We knew the facts already, but that didn’t make hearing about accidents that had taken friends, co-workers, and family away from us. Twilight then pulled out one of the folders that she had hidden in her saddle bags and presented it to Celestia. “That folder holds several of the orders that the nobles hooved down to solely the Smoke Mountain region of the Celestial Pacific.” As Celestia looked through the folder Twilight had presented her, Twilight turned to face the crowd, “Now to explain to everypony before I lay out the after effects of these orders, I must go over a few facts of the Smokey Mountain region. The Smokey Mountain region handles mostly freight traffic along a line that holds the two steepest gradients in the entire nation for a class A railroad, with the steepest being a 2.9 percent. That means that for every 100 feet of track, there is a rise of 2.9 feet, something that is near unheard of outside of small railroads built for the logging industry. Because of this, their roster is full of heavy freight and passenger locomotives that are used to their very limit on a daily basis, just to get over the mountain, meaning they are in a constant need of inspection and repair to prevent destruction. Yet one of the first orders you will find in that folder was one that limited daily maintenance to the passenger locomotive roster, the smaller section of the roster and the ones that usually need less maintenance than the locomotive used for freight. Many sources that I’ve talked to over the last few days that work or have worked on the railway have informed me that the only time any member of the current freight roster is brought in for proper maintenance is when said engine is on the brink of a catastrophic failure. Additionally, they severely reduced the budget for track maintenance and inspection, something desperately needed for a railroad whose tracks are quite literally built into the side of a mountain. And once more, they outright banned the use of two classes of engine that were specifically built for the railway that were made to handle long express passenger and freight trains over the steep mountain grades. Many of these changes has lead to nearly half the railway’s staff to quit for the sake of their own health, dropping the railroad staff from over 2,100 ponies before the take over, to a staff size now of barely 1,300. All of this have lead to a railway which is understaffed, overworked, badly maintained, and on the brink of a major disaster. In fact, one was narrowly averted just recently, and is part of the basis for this very trial.” Twilight then powered up the same projection spell that Quick Case had been using to show images throughout the trial, and an image of #97 before her accident appeared. “This is Tall Tale Mountain Short Line locomotive #97, as you have already been shown.” The image then shifted to one of the Dragon Tooth River Bridge, “And this is the Dragon Tooth River Bridge, which spans the Dragon Tooth River at the summit of the Smokey Mountain. We’ll come back to this in a moment.” The image then shifted again to show a wide angle shot of the pile of splintered wood and twisted steel that had once been a Crystal Empire freight train, “And this, is the result of the accident that was caused by #97. Which, again, you have already seen. But now, let’s go back to the Dragon Tooth River.” The image shifted once again to show the bridge with the damage caused by #97. “Now some of you might notice the damaged span in the center of the bridge. This damage was caused the same day as the accident with the Crystal Northern freight train. I can imagine that some of you might be wondering what caused this damage, and how it connects here. Well, let me show you.” The image shifted once more, receiving a mild gasp from the audience and Celestia, as the new image appeared on screen. It was a picture of Bertha strung out and hoisting something up out of the river, an engine. The image then zoomed in on the engine enough so the number on the side of the cab could be read. Starting back at everypony in the courtroom, were the two white numbers, 9 and 7. “This is Celestial Pacific light freight locomotive #97, the exact locomotive Fire Stoker was in charge of the day of the accident. The very same locomotive in which he was nearly killed when the bridge he was crossing, the Dragon Tooth River Bridge, partly collapsed underneath him while he was crossing it, thus starting the chain reaction that lead to one of the region’s most expensive rail accident and left an engineer from the Crystal Empire dead.” The tension in the room began to rise once more, as Twilight shut off her spell and continued, “I’ve talked with not only Fire Stoker and his fire stallion Coal Dust, but many of the other ponies working in the Smokey Mountains who interacted with them on the day of the accident. From what I’ve heard, many strange things happened that day, all centered around Fire Stoker’s run. Among these was the fact that the Vanhoover yard master was informed that the maintenance slow order put in place on the area around the bridge had been lifted, information that he then passed on to Fire Stoker. Information that I found to be completely false. Work had barely been started on the damaged span of the bridge by the time Fire Stoker hit it on his return trip to Tall Tale. But, the most interesting thing I found was that all of these events and changes that have occurred over the last four years are all connected, with one common goal in mind. The destruction of Fire Stoker!” That brought around a proper gasp from the collection of ponies, including myself. Twilight then walked up to where Blueblood sat sweating in his seat, “It was just taking too long for your liking wasn’t it Blueblood? So you decided to speed the process up, take care of the problem for good hmm?" Blueblood continued to sweat in his seat under the full gaze of the entire courtroom and both Princesses, until finally, he caved, “He was just supposed to quit!” He finally yelled. The largest gasp of the day went up at that one sentence, and Celestia’s full gaze fell to the blubbering Prince, “I-I mean he was just supposed to get angered to the point of quitting. It was never meant to go this far, but he just wouldn’t leave!” “Well why did you want me out of the way so damn bad!” I yelled back, my anger finally boiling over. With a smirk full of confidence, Twilight was more than happy to supply the answer. Levitating another folder out of her saddle bags, and presented it to Celestia once again. Celestia quickly went over the contents of the folder, her eyes growing wider with ever sentence she read. For those not reading, Twilight was happy to explain, “In that folder holds the reason why the nobles wanted Fire Stoker off the railway. That document states that Fire Stoker, at the ripe old age of eight years old, became the fifth owner of the Tall Tale Mountain Short Line, receiving equal ownership, power, and decision making by share number, as the four owners who signed it, Ditchlight, Bulkhead, High Ball, and Hotbox.” That sent up another gasp from the Tall Tale ponies in attendance, including myself. I looked over to Hotbox, only to see him smile at me, and then wink at the other owners, who happily smiled and nodded back. It was at this point Twilight decided to continue once again, “Ironically, this document was signed just four days prior to Hotbox being arrested under his false charges. Because of his arrest under such high charges, his ownership in the company, and thus the decision power of his shares, were given to the crown, who would normally sign it back to the railways other owners. But, instead, the ownership was bought and passed to Blueblood and his other noble conspirators. Then, slowly over the next fifteen years, the nobles bought up the trackage rights leading to the ones owned by the short line, allowing them to push their noses further into the railway’s business without actually acting, since anything they tried to push forth would have been struck down by the other four owners with their combined stack in the company. They did all of this so they could try to fly under the radar of the company’s three primary owners still remaining, Ditchlight, Bulkhead, and High Ball. Problem is, they failed. Once the three owners caught wind of what the nobles were planning, they began funneling their stake in the company to Fire Stoker bit by bit. When Bueblood and the other nobles finally approached them to purchase their stakes in the company, they agreed, but their plan had already been carried out. When they finalized the sale to the nobles, for 30 millions bits each, they passed over the smallest percent ownership currently allowed by law, five percent. Of course Blueblood and the others didn’t learn about this until they went to try and have the railroad transferred to them, and were shocked to find that they only owned 35 percent of the company, the other 65 being held by Fire Stoker.” I sat in my seat in a complete state of shock, just trying to process what I had just learned. Not only had I been made an owner of the railway when I was eight bucking years old, but for at least the last four years I had been the primary owner, and I never even knew! While I tried to restart my brain, Twilight continued to push her assault, “But there was a loophole that they found with the forms that implemented Fire Stoker’s ownership. No where on the contract is there a signature from Fire Stoker. It makes sense why when you think of the original intentions, it was supposed to be a surprise for him, and by Equestrian law, that is perfectly legal. However, once Fire Stoker became the primary owner of the railroad, things got more complicated. To remain the primary owner of the railway without his signature being given, Fire Stoker had to remain an employee of the railroad, with a clean legal record. If either of these were breached, Fire Stoker would lose his part of ownership, and it would be passed to the next largest owner, a.k.a. Blueblood and his noble friends. Or of course, he could just meet his maker in a railway accident.” Twilight returned her attention to a now heavily sweating Blueblood, “So, Blueblood, which one were you going for first? Or did you just go for all three and wait to see which one worked the fastest?” “All he needed to do was quit! Even if he knew of his ownership, we knew he wouldn’t sign over the line rights to us! His stubbornness would have held up the process of uniting the nation with one major rail company!” Blueblood yelled, trying to defend his actions. There was a few seconds pause, before a small chuckle began to fill the courtroom. Then, it began to grow louder, and louder. Everypony turned and stared as they caught sight of Hotbox trying his best not to hit the floor from laughing. I found it kinda weird to see him laughing at such a heavy situation. Once he started to calm down and finally regain himself, he spoke, “That’s what this was all about? Building some big national railroad ran by yourselves? Do you really think that some big government run railway is how we fix our problems? By Holy Faust how crazy are you? I will admit, even before I got locked up I could see that there were problems on the other roads. I’ve only seen them get worse since then. Our problem isn’t that we have too many too many ponies running the roads, its that we can’t see all our problems at the same time. That’s why I came up with an idea, a way to make it easier for all the railroads to communicate and figure out what our problems are and how to fix them. I called the system, The Guild of Equestrian Railwaymen, something that I proposed to Princess Celestia just a week before my arrest. A meeting I know for a fact you overheard, and one I know you saw as a threat to your control over and income from the railroads. Tell me I’m wrong.” He finished with a cocky smirk directed at Blueblood. It was at this point, Princess Celestia had heard enough, “Prince Blueblood. Your actions in the pursuit of monetary gain have led to injury, destruction, and death, be it intentional or not. Your voluntary actions ruined the lives of hundreds of ponies, all to increase the numbers in your income line. For that, I place you under arrest. You shall go to trial the moment we know the full depths of your actions. Until then, you shall be held at Canterhorn Correctional Facilities, with no chance of bail. Guards!” A flabbergasted Blueblood then found himself being himself being hauled out of the courtroom by two of Celestia’s guards. Celestia then turned her attention to a still smirking Hotbox, “Hotbox. For the last nineteen years, you have suffered alone for no reason. From the information I have seen, the charges filed against you were completely falsified. Yet, by the power invested in me, I grant you a full royal pardon to be effective immediately.” She then turned to me, “And Fire Stoker. I cannot imagine what you have went through in the last few years because of the actions of a greedy few. From what I have seen, I hereby declare you, not guilty. Considering this situation, once the trial against Blueblood has concluded, his ownership of the company will be passed to you. Until then, himself and the other nobles who have helped him will begin paying you back all they bits in revenue from the railway that you have rightfully been owed for the last four years, all 27.9 billion bits. Court is adjourned!” I’m used to loud noises, kinda comes with working on the railroad, but the roar that went up among the ponies inside and outside the courtroom; yes outside, turns out they had been broadcasting the trial over the radio and I could actually hear them, deafened even me. Coal Dust cleared the wall that was dividing the room, landing on me in a flying tackle, “Ya did it Stokes! Ya bucking did it!” He yelled over the roar of the courtroom as he hugged me while I was still on the floor. Eventually he did help me up, only for me to get piled on by every Tall Tale and rail pony that had been in the room. Eventually I was able to break out of the pony pile to find Hotbox, prison jumpsuit removed and sitting on the desk Blueblood had been sitting behind just a few short minutes earlier. I couldn’t stop a smile from forming on my face as I walked over and hugged him for the first time in 19 years.The old stallion chuckled as he hugged me back, “Nice to see you too Stokes.” He said in a low, happy voice. When we finally broke apart, Hotbox couldn’t help himself but say, “Caused a bit of a ruckus while I was gone, didn’t you?” I had to laugh, “Yeah, you could say that.” We both shared a good laugh, before my face fell and I had to ask, “Why?” Hotbox raised an eyebrow at me as all the other ponies emptied from the courtroom, leaving me alone with my grandfather. “Why what?” He asked. “Why did you just sit alone in a cell for 19 years and not say anything? Why did you just sit and do nothing? Why did you make me an owner of the railway when I was eight years old?” Hotbox sat there and thought for a second, “I guess it’s because I knew my time would come. I knew complaining wouldn’t get me very far, so I just sat back and waited for my time to come. Took a little while, but it came all the same.” He then smiled at me, “And the reason I made you an owner is very simple. Myself and your father worked our flanks off so that I could support him, and he support you and your mother, and so that we all could have a happy life. We both felt that you deserved to never worry about such stupid things as bits, so we came up with the plan together. And we did it because we could see the look in your eyes any time you were around the railroad. We knew that you wouldn’t be able to get away from that life just like we weren’t. We knew how big the railway was growing, and we knew that being a co-owner of it would let you be able to live your life however you wanted, and never have to worry about a thing. Never thought any of this would happen, but it worked out in the end now didn’t it?” He finished with another chuckle. “That it did.” Said another voice behind me. I jumped a bit and turned to find Princess Celestia herself standing right behind me. Hotbox on the other hoof, just smiled and nodded, “Nice to see you again you Majesty.” Celestia’s face fell, “Hotbox, I am truly sorry for everything you’ve been through over the last few years. I..” Hotbox stopped her with a wave of a hoof, “It’s fine your Majesty. You had no real way knowing what was going on. I knew everything would workout fine in the end, and it did. So, I say we just put all of this behind us eh?” Celestia let her smile return, “You are one of a kind Hotbox. But yes, I believe you are right. Let us put all this hate and bad blood behind us.” She then motioned towards the doors to the throne room, “Now, let’s leave this place of anger. From what I have been told you have quite the group of ponies waiting to see you again Fire Stoker.” I smiled and nodded, “Gladly.” With that, the three of us turned and exited the room. After the quick walk down the haul, we were met with the main doors to the castle, which Celestia happily opened with a flick of her magic. As the doors opened, the ponies outside broke into cheers once again at the sight of me and Hotbox. I smiled as I rushed forward and was once again embraced by my railroad family. I was the happiest I had been in a long long time. For the first time in years, my life was out from under the rule of the noble hoof, I was back in control of my life, and I never had to worry about bits again. But more importantly, I could return home and help my railroad family rebuild what we had once had. It was one of the best days of my life. For hours we stayed in Canterlot and celebrated, we had good reason to after all. But, all good things had to come to an end at some point. So, as the day grew old and night began to show its head, the group split so ponies could catch trains back to their hometowns. That thought made me question something, so I turned to Coal Dust who was walking at my side, “How did all of you get down here anyways.” Dusty smirked, “Oh, just wait and see.’ He said with an ominous chuckle. As we got closer to Canterlot Station, I noticed a long passenger train sitting at the platform being let by two “Big Sixes”. I did a quick count of the cars, “Three, four, five, damn forty seven cars. You guys needed a lot of space.” Coal Dust laughed, “Well, that’s what happens when you gotta get eleven hundred ponies to the same place. Now come on, we saved you a spot up in the first car.” I nodded and motioned for Hotbox to follow, but he shook his head, “No, you go catch up with your friends. Your mother, the big six, and me have a few things to talk about.” By the big six, he meant the railways old owners and their foals. Even though it meant I couldn’t immediately fully catch up with my grandfather, I felt that since I waited 19 years, I could wait a few more hours. I smiled and nodded, “Alright, but feel free to stop up and chat.” Hotbox smiled back, “I just might have to do that.” With that, we all boarded the train. Half an hour later we were well underway into the journey back home, and me and my friends had spent the whole time talking about what we could now do to help the railway. But as I heard the engines up front snort as they charged at one of the grades in front of us, a thought came to my mind. “Hey Torch, you got your harmonica on you.” Blow Torch laughed as he reached his good hoof into one of his denim pockets, “Like I would leave my house without it.” He said as he pulled it out. The old harmonica had seen better days, its wood and metal scratched, and covered in layers of axle grease, but it still sounded as good as the day Torch bought it when he was six years old. The others quickly caught on, “Oh no, here we go guys. Stokes what to do sing song again.” I laughed, “Oh come on! We haven’t done something like this in a while. And I think an old favorite is in store.” The others laughed, and without me having to say anything, they knew exactly what song I had in mind. “You think you can play that thing with only one hoof Torch?” Red asked. Torch laughed, “I think I’ll manage. Y’all ready?” We nodded, so he struck up the tune. As we let the first notes play out, I looked over at Dusty, who cocked a smile. The two of us always started of this song. When the note hit, me and Dusty cut in right on cue, “Smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves. I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the eight freight blues!” Crankshaft and Ash Pan, always the ones to go next, hit their note perfectly, “Well we’re running late in a sorry state on 7218, she’s over do for boiler work and I can’t get her to steam. With a thousand tons of coal behind and a tender full of black, dispatch sent me to Hoofington and now they won’t answer back.” This time, Blastpipe took the chorus, “Smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves! I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the Tall Tale Blues!” Smoke Box, and surprisingly Fire Box, took the next set, “Now across the cab the driver sits and he’s staring straight ahead. He hasn’t shut his mouth in the eight months since I started at the shed. But he’s drawn a line across the cab for each of us to stand, since he learned I liked the Cloudsdale puffs while he was a Baltimare fan.” The rest of us laughed as Smoke Box punched Fire’s arm and Red Hot took the chorus, “Well smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves! I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the Olde Grade Blues!” This time, it was our turn again, but we were surprised to hear another voice cut in, “Well I fired her thin and piled it in, but still she wouldn’t go.” We turned and were surprised to see Iron sides and Sand Dome walking in, Iron singing right on key, “When the drive pins dropped we were forced to stop on the main line or blow.” He smiled as he sat down in at one of the seats nearby us, Sand Dome following suit. “I smashed the clankers, used some fire, tried every trick I know. But they bent at the start and those back shop farts blamed us for their new woe.” We all laughed again, this time letting Sand Dome contribute and take the chorus, “Smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves. I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the late freight blues!” With the last “solo” chorus upon us, Dusty and I were more than happy to take our turn, “With a one in sixty drop ahead and our loco out of sight, we had to stop and close the spot to save other ponys’ life. The load came upon the engine, while her line was showing green. We went looking for the engine, but a wreck was all to be seen.” Crankshaft and Ash took the last “solo” chorus, “Smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves. I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the no brake blues!” We all smiled, and took the last stanza together, “Well the owners come from Canterhorn and their greed we can’t describe! They only know how to money steal with their wallets open wide! We can’t change their budget, and our line is damn near dead! We wish their balls would turn to bulldogs and bite the sods to death!” And with the song near over, all our voices rose for the final two chorus, “Smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves. I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the eight freight blues!” “Smoke in my eyes, soot in my mane, cinders under my hooves. I’m watching the needle falling away and singing the eight freight blues!” With a final tear on his harmonica, Blast Pipe ended the song with a joyful cheer from everypony else in the coach. As my friends laughed and congratulated themselves on another group song nailed, I looked around at all of them. All of these ponies, who I could happily call friend, all of them supporting me during one rough patch in my life or another, and all of them happy to see me come out the other side in one piece. They were the reason I hadn’t simply faced fate and let all of this happen. Them, my friends, my railroad family, the ponies who helped me understand where I belonged in this world, they were the reason that I had been able to get through all of this. And now, I could properly repay them for all their help, by giving them the lives back that they worked so hard to get, that they deserved. I smiled as I let Dusty wrap a forehoof around me and drag me closer to the group as Blow Torch struck up a fast tempo on his harmonica, just a little solo for himself that we were all happy to listen to. As he worked the instrument like a pro, even while only being able to use one hoof, I my smile grew. I could finally give back to the family that had given my blood family everything, but even more, I could go back to being the one thing that made me the happiest in the world. A colt with a train.