As Pear finished telling the story of how Duke paid Stuart out, Apple Bloom appeared to be lost in thought. "Is there any trace left of that old line where he lived?" she asked.
"Ah don't think so," Pear replied. "The entire area's gone back to nature now, although some of the original route is now the Arlesdale Railway."
Scootaloo looked over. "That's not far from here!" she said suddenly. "Arlesburgh West is only a few miles away."
Sweetie Belle was thinking too. "Wait," she said. "You mentioned a Cheerilee in one of the stories. Isn't one of our teachers a Cheerilee?"
"Yer right!" Apple Bloom replied. "She teaches us English, as well as overseein' the library. Can't be easy doin' two jobs at once."
"How about we ask her tomorrow?" Scootaloo asked. "She's bound to have something to tell us!"
"Ah'll come in too," Pear Butter told the trio. "Ah'd be interested in lookin' about too. But before then, y'all need ta get off ta bed." She got up out of her chair, and walked up the stairs, shutting off the light as she did so.
The next day at Knapford Secondary School, Cheerilee dismissed her last class before break time. She was quite a bit older now, and was dressed somewhat more formally than she had been in the day, wearing a white formal shirt, a brown vest, a green skirt with a flower pattern on it, and brown boots. "Now I can have a rest," she said.
She was soon proven wrong, as the door flew open, and three freshmen fell on top of each other. "Ya wouldn't mind gettin' off, Scootaloo?" Apple Bloom asked, at the bottom of the pile.
"Why are you asking me? Sweetie Belle's weighing me down?"
"Are you calling me fat?"
"No, but I can't move with you on top of me!"
"Ah kinda need ta be able ta breathe down here as well!"
Cheerilee walked over, and helped Sweetie Belle off the pile. Scootaloo soon got to her feet, and Apple Bloom soon followed. "Hello girls!" she said. "How can I help you today?"'
"We want ta know about yer time with Duke!" Apple Bloom asked. "Ma's been tellin' us these stories about you and an engine called Duke. Somethin' about a railway in the hills."
"Good heavens!" Cheerilee replied. "Now that was a long time ago." She glanced up, and suddenly saw Pear standing in the door. "Buttercup?"
"Ah go formally by Pear Butter now," Pear replied. "But it's great ta see ya again. How ya doin'?"
"Oh, same as ever. Teaching, stuff like that."
Scootaloo glanced back. "Now it makes sense why you wanted to come with us!" she said. "You used to work there yourself!"
Pear nodded. "As did Bright. It's how Ah met him, and the rest is history."
Apple Bloom had to bend down and pick her jaw up off the floor in amazement at this piece of news. But Cheerilee soon got to business, rolling out an Ordnance Survey map of the Arlesburgh area. "I never forgot Duke," she said, "and I regret leaving him the way I did. I want to make this right, and make Duke happy again."
She pointed to the map. "This is the Arlesdale Railway," she quickly explained, "which runs from Arlesburgh West to Arlesdale. It follows the old aligment of the Mid Sodor for 10 miles, before swinging off near the site of the old works. The Mid Sodor continued straight for several miles into the hills. So if we go there, we should find him."
"Hooray!" Sweetie Belle cried. "Cumbrian Mountain Crusaders Engine Rescuers!"
Pear looked at her.
"With adult supervision, of course."
Later on, the five of them caught a train on the Arlesdale railway from Arlesburgh West out to Arlesdale. They got off and headed into the hills. Soon enough, they arrived at the site of the old works. "It's changed completely since we were last here!" Cheerilee said. "I don't recognise the place!" And she was right. The area was completely overgrown and covered in shrubs and bushes.
"If you had never looked at a map," Pear observed, "You'd never have guessed there had ever been a railway here."
Scootaloo consulted her list. "There's two engines in the area," she said. "Duke, and Stanley. So, I suggest we split up and go look as two separate teams."
"That sounds like a good idea," Apple Bloom replied. "Ah'll go with Cheerilee ta find Duke, and you two can go with Ma ta find Stanley."
So, they split up and went in separate directions to find their respective engines. They found nothing that day, but vowed to return the next day. And they returned the next day, and the next, and the next. And still they found nothing. But they refused to give up. The search came to an unexpected end on the fifth day. Cheerilee and Apple Bloom scrambled up a bank, having first cleared a muddy ditch, and stopped on top of a hill. They had only paused for a moment when the ground gave way under Apple Bloom's weight, and she fell straight down.
"APPLE BLOOM!" Cheerilee cried.
Apple Bloom fell for a few seconds, before landing on top of something cold and metallic. A few seconds after she had stopped falling, there was a loud coughing noise.
"Excuse me?" a voice asked, grumpily, and clearly annoyed he had been woken from his sleep. "Are you a vandal? Cheerilee says vandals break in and smash things."
It was a voice that Cheerilee would have recognised from miles away. "Duke!" she cried. "Everybody, we've found him! We've found our Sleeping Beauty!"
"I take it you found me quite by accident," Duke grumbled. "It's only natural; I thought nobody was ever going to come and get me out."
"Stuart and Falcon miss ya terribly," Pear said, having scrambled up the hill and dropped in. "They live on a nearby railway now, and want to see ya."
"They did remember," Duke sighed. "Well, the sooner I'm out of this shed the better. Did you find Stanley anywhere?"
"He was stuck under a mound of Earth," Scootaloo answered. "We'll need a crane to lift him out."
"Hopefully he's learned sense," Duke muttered.
A few hours later, Duke was loaded onto a lorry and driven to Crovan's Gate works, where he was repaired, and Cheerilee got him up to date on all that was happening on the Island (as a lot had changed since the 1990s). After he was fixed, he was taken to the Skarloey Railway and lowered onto the rails.
Just then, Sir Handel and Peter Sam arrived. "Who's the new arrival?" asked Peter Sam.
"There's a new engine?" Silverstream asked. "YAY! I love meeting new people!"
"Shhh!" Sir Handel hissed. "You'll wake Grandpuff up!"
Just then, Duke opened his eyes. "Stuart?" he asked. "Falcon? I've missed you two."
"Is this the engine you've been speaking of?" asked Gallus.
"Yes, I am," Duke answered. "And I am quite annoyed that you two woke me up. When I was a younger engine, engines were-"
"Seen and not heard, we know," Peter Sam replied. "Thing is, we're not Stuart and Falcon anymore. I'm Peter Sam, and he's Sir Handel."
"I'll never get used to that," Duke grunted.
"Besides, we can keep you in order now," Sir Handel joked.
"Keep me in order?" Duke laughed. "Be off with you, you impertinent scallywags!" But he knew they were only joking, and as his eyes twinkled for the first time in years, he looked forward to working again alongside his driver, Cheerilee.