Pipp sat on the seafront, looking closely at a notebook in her hand. She was trying a number of different musical ideas for her next song, keen to avoid simply bashing out the same thing over and over again.
"Hmm, maybe this one," she said to herself. She began humming something to herself, then stopped. "No, that sounds too much like Don't Stop Beliving. Maybe this one?" She started sketching out some new lyrics.
"There- is a place, where- No! That's California Girls!" She looked over the seafront in frustration. "Why can't I think of anything?"
Salty then rattled past, coming to a stop. "Hello Pipp!" he said. "You look unhappy."
"That's just it!" she said. "I'm trying to come up with a new idea, and nothing's coming to my head! What I've created so far sounds like existing songs!"
Salty noted this, and smiled. "Why not take inspiration from the sea? That's what the sailors of old did when they wrote the sea shanties."
Pipp's eyes lit up. "Sea shanties! That's it! I do an album of nautical themed music! Got any suggestions for a playlist?"
"How about 'Wellerman', 'The Last Shanty', and 'All for me Grog' as starting points?" Salty suggested.
"That's a bit problematic," Pipp admitted. "The last one, I meant. It'd hardly be appropriate for a singer with a large child audience to be promoting drinking."
"True. How about changing references to grog and beer to different smoothie types?"
Pipp scribbled something down. "And it's all for my smoothie. I'll need to adjust the word setting a bit, but that's a start. Thanks Salty!"
A loud crashing and banging suddenly started up from the yard. "Sounds as though Izzy's still at it," Salty said.
"I'd best make sure she's not making too much of a mess," Pipp said, and set off for the yard. When she arrived, she found it in a complete mess. Trucks were strewn in random sidings, and some were so poorly positioned as to make getting into some sidings borderline impossible.
"No!" Izzy cried in frustration. "That's not it! Why can't I think of anything?"
"You're still making a mess!" Porter interrupted. "Somebody is going to have to clean this up, and it's probably going to be me."
"You may have creative block," Pipp suggested. "This is a condition where an artist finds themselves unable to create content."
"Is it permanent?" Izzy asked.
"Not usually," Pipp replied. "But it can last for a while. I'd suggest doing something very different to your usual output to try and clear it."
"Is that what you do?"
"No, mainly as I've never had creative block."
"That's a lie!" Charles added. "You didn't write songs for months one time!"
Pipp, looking embarrassed, simply glanced to her phone, only to see her inbox on several social media apps was absolutely flooded with messages. All of them were asking when her next album was coming out.
And all were asking for the songs to be similar but different to previous ones.
To say things were awkward was an understatement.
Work on the seafront sidings had gotten slow, and Sunny had been able to park Salty up for a bit and sell some smoothies.
"Here you go!" she said, pushing one drink towards an excited customer. "One tutti frutti, coming right up!"
"Thank you Sunny!" she said, before taking a sip. "You haven't lost your touch!"
"No problem!" Sunny called. "Enjoy!" She glanced over to the yard. "I hope that mess in the yard is sorted out soon. How are we supposed to get things moving around here if the yards are blocked up?"
"Sunny!" Izzy called, suddenly popping up in her face.
"AHH!" Sunny recoiled and fell back onto a chair. "Izzy, please don't do that!"
"Do I look desparate?" Izzy asked.
"A bit?"
"That's because I'm super desperate and have no idea what I'm doing!" Izzy exclaimed.
A passer-by, the man in the fedora hat called Rob, nodded sagely. "You just summarised adulthood in one sentence."
Sunny nodded. "Is it the bracelets?"
"No! I'm trying to come up with something new and I have run out of ideas!"
Sunny sighed, and then smiled at her friend. "It could be worse. Nobody can create like you do. Your ability to use everyday objects to create the extraordinary is unmatched in this town. Why not try going back to your roots and finding inspiration there?"
Izzy's eyes lit up. "My roots! Thanks, Sunny!" With a wave, she sped off down the road.
"No problem."
Sunny was so focused on seeing Izzy off safely she didn't notice Misty leaving something on her stand.
Up at Truro, Alexandra was still sitting in the bay platform. She had been shooing people away from her interior ever since they had arrived. "I don't want muddy boots all over the floor!" she said. "Or on my upholstery, for that matter. It was very expensive."
Somebody else attempted to board, holding an ice cream. His friend had a beach ball in his hands, seemingly ready for a day at the sea.
"Not you two either!" she said. "Sticky ice cream and sand! Whatever would the performers think?"
Moments later, two men arrived, both dressed in matching suits. One was tall and thin. And the other was short and fat. "Excuse me?" said the thin one. "Is this the railmotor?"
"It most certainly is," Lord Haven told him. "Are you the entertainers?"
"We are indeed!" said the fat one. "Baz and Bernie, at your service."
"Well," Lord Haven said, "Get in, and we shall be on our way."
The two men boarded, and the signal changed. Alexandra set off at such speed that she was into the tunnel in less than a minute.
"Wait!" shouted the station master. "You're supposed to be taking a van with you!"
Misty's radio buzzed as she moved towards the yard. She switched it on. "Receiving you loud and clear, over."
"Took you long enough to switch the thing on," Opaline said. "I thought you'd gotten lost, like the time I rescued you. Anything to report?"
"Based on my observations, I think that the magic is somehow connected to Falmouth."
"And the Nobel Peace Prize for stating the blindingly obvious goes to Misty," Opaline sighed. "Don't think, be certain. You sound like an idiot otherwise."
"Well, I think me and Bellerophon could-"
"Bellerophon and I."
"Well, I think Bellerophon and I could figure it out if we could somehow get closer to Sunny."
"An interesting observation," Opaline sighed. "Be on standby for my instructions. And has Boomer turned up yet?"
"I haven't been able to find him, but-"
"Oi, you over there!" shouted a yard worker. "Get off the radio and take Bellerophon up to Truro. The railmotor's left a van behind that needs conveying to Falmouth."
"Sorry, gotta go." Misty turned the radio off and sprinted for the engine shed, where Bellerophon was waiting.
As Bellerophon left the yard for Truro, Charles and Salty had gotten to work on cleaning up the mess in the yard. "How does one person make so much mess?" Salty asked.
"Beats me," Charles replied. "We could do with an extra engine."
"Hello chaps!" said a voice. Moments later, Ray arrived in the yard with Pipp at the controls.
"Oh dear," Charles sighed. "Captain OCD's here. Here to file couplings?"
"Uhh, Pipp, what are you doing driving mom's engine?" Zipp asked.
"Sophie broke down, so mom let me borrow Ray," Pipp explained.
"Let's get to work then."
Alexandra arrived at Falmouth to see the chaos unfolding in the docks. The two men got out and looked behind them in surprise.
"Bernie, where are the children?" Baz asked.
"More to the point," Bernie added, "where are the props? We had them all in a van!"
"Children's entertainers?" Alexandra said. "Robert, why didn't you tell me they were children's entertainers?!"
"Does it really matter what type of entertainer they are?" Lord Haven replied. "You assumed they were something else, all by yourself."
A bus pulled up in the station parking lot as another argument broke out in the yard.
"Would you believe it?" Charles huffed, as he observed the other engines whilst propelling some plank wagons. "Ray's done nothing but file vans away in those sidings."
"And there goes the diagram 3 vans which-"
"RAY!" Charles boomed. "STOP FILING!"
"No," Ray said, "this is important. If we don't have this place logically ordered it's just to end up a gigantic mess again. And which types of vans go where is quite important, as-"
"It doesn't matter! Vans are vans!"
"No they aren't. There's vans with metal roofs, vans with sliding doors, ones designed to carry fish, ones meant to carry bananas, ones that are fitted, ones without fitted brakes, ones with..."
Charles tuned Ray out as he rambled on about different types of vans. "We're going to be here forever."
"Only because you won't order them logically," Ray interrupted. "If you just bung them in any old way like a yobbo we'll have a harder time locating the stuff we need."
"Can we stop arguing and start sorting?" Sunny asked.
Bellerophon rolled into the platforms with a van. "Sorry I'm late, folks!" he said. "Just brought the van in."
"Excellent!" Baz said. "Now we can build our stage, and perform to the children."
Alexandra said nothing. Her face had gone beetroot. This entire mess with the staging and the lack of audience was her fault. And all because she had jumped to conclusions.
No sooner had that happened then Porter sped past, with a load fitted to a flatbed. "Can't stop! Got a delivery to make!"
"Whatever in the world is going on?" Misty asked. "I must keep a closer eye on this."
Porter screeched to a halt as the last trucks were being put away, parking next to one of the harbour cranes.
Izzy secured him in place and walked over to the yard. "Hey guys! Did I miss anything?"
"Only us cleaning up your mess," Charles grumbled.
"Charles, enough," Zipp said. "So, where'd you go?"
"Sunny suggested I go back to my roots, so I headed north and eventually found something on my way. I fixed it up, and it's currently being offloaded from that flatbed."
When the crane was finished, Izzy walked over and opened the tarpaulin. It revealed a tricycle moped, painted blue, with a large box on the back.
"Roll up, roll up for the mystery tour!" Izzy called. "Behold, my portable palace of personal productivity! My tireless treasures! My wagon of whimsy! My Trycicle of Triumph! The Powered Perambulator of Peregrination!"
"She has swallowed a thesaurus!" Ray joked.
"And not only that, I made a utility belt for myself in case I need to do repairs on the go," Izzy continued. "Oil, lubricant, spanners, a wrench, some tools, and a sleeping bag for on the move. Or even on the stay."
"That would have come in handy on our first adventure," Sunny said. "By the way, thanks for the compact Pipp!"
"Which compact?" Pipp asked.
"The one you left on my stand. Looks great, and even seems to have a camera in it. Shall we try it out?"
"Oh, that one! Totally forgot buying it, yeah!"
Zipp looked at a notepad in her hand. "Pipp forgot something she bought? That's odd."
The gang turned about for a group photo, with the engines in the background.
"So, this is what we are up against," Opaline said, as she observed the video feed. "They are in no way a match for the Reverend. I would probably already have beaten them if it weren't for the blithering idiots under my command."
Suddenly, the feed cut out. "NO! Why did it stop?"
"I have reason to believe that the signal is exceptionally poor near the lighthouse," Boomer said over the radio. "I'm observing it now, and they've just gone inside. It's well known that magic can interfere with communication devices, so perhaps the source of the magic is there."
"Keep me notified of any future developments," Opaline replied. "We need to get somebody on the inside..."
After a long, hard day, the five friends had finally found time to mark Sunny's birthday.
"Thanks guys!" Sunny smiled. "This is the first time I've had you guys here, and this is the best birthday I've had in years. Shame mom and dad couldn't be here, but they had something important to attend to."
Pipp sighed. "Sorry to be a moaner, but I feel a bit down."
"It's not something in the cake, is it?" Sunny asked. "It's an old Devonian recipe."
"No, the cake was delicious," Pipp replied. "It's just that I haven't figured out my new song."
Izzy smiled, and turned to a record player behind her. "Try it out!"
Pipp walked over and popped the needle on. Moments later, a familiar song began to play.
"Had my head in the clouds
But now I truly see!"
"It's a remix!"
"Cooked it up whilst having a tea break on my way home," Izzy said. "I even found some alternate lyrics you'd suggested by scrapped."
"Awesome!" Pipp said, and grabbed a microphone.
"Glowing hearts of the world's people
super lights beneath the trees!
"We're not just one/ (not one, not one)
It's you and me! (it's you and me)
People livin' large in unity-ty-ty-ty!
All you need is your beat!"