Nurse Redheart sat near the operating table, her head in her hooves. She received just as much of a shock as Ironside when she saw who her latest patient was. Little Gallow Drop’s diagnosis was bad, to put it frankly. Her entire ribcage was shattered by the impact, and it ended up puncturing her skin, leading to the many lacerations on her body. She was lucky though: none of the bone shards damaged any of her vital organs. Redheart declared this as nothing short of miraculous, but Gallow would not survive unless her ribcage was wholly repaired. For that, she was going to need a little magic.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door opening. Redheart turned to see Twilight Sparkle and Spike, both fully decked out in surgeon’s uniforms. Twilight was the only unicorn the nurse could turn to at this point, since Rarity was liable to lose her lunch in this situation. Spike felt uneasy about this, too. He had never seen surgery performed before, but the description Twilight gave was not very encouraging. Nevertheless, he was willing to risk his stomach to save the little unicorn now lying on the table. She was still out from her brush with death, but Redheart gave her an anesthetic to be safe. “Are you two ready?” the nurse asked.
“We are,” Twilight replied.
“Uh, Twilight…” Spike began. The purple unicorn placed a hoof on her assistant’s shoulder.
“You’ll do fine, Spike,” she soothed, “Don’t worry.”
Back on the rails, Applejack pulled 2398 out ahead of the express to send for a second engine. She backed the Atlantic into the siding and set about switching the points that led back to the roundhouse. Ironside sat on the fireman’s side, tending to the boiler. He trusted Applejack with his locomotives, since he had given her a few lessons on how to drive trains with one of the yard engines. After setting the points, AJ climbed back into the cab and backed the Atlantic towards the turntable. Before setting the second set of points, she jumped back down and ran over to the nearest operating engine. The engineer readily agreed to take over the express and set off as soon as Applejack returned to 2398. This time, Ironside left the cab to set the points to the turntable. Once he was back in, AJ pulled the engine onto the table, which spun around until 2398 was facing into his stall. He slowly pulled in, stopping just a few inches from the end of the track.
In the operating room, Twilight and Nurse Redheart began the incision into Gallow’s body. Twilight gingerly sliced Gallow open with the scalpel. It was hard work, not just from trying to keep the blade steady, but also from Twilight’s gag reflex, which was starting to rear its head. Spike, quite frankly, wasn’t doing much better. Redheart watched the scalpel with baited breath, ready to intervene in case anything went awry. Luckily, that never happened. Twilight now began the difficult task of magically lifting each one of the bone fragments and reattaching it to its partner. She not only had to piece Gallow’s ribcage back together, but she also had to fuse the shards back into a whole ribcage. Spike stood on the table. He had to hold each shard up against the remainder of the ribcage while Twilight fused the shard back on. Fusing materials together (even two of the same kind) took lots of concentration on her part. Spike also had to hold the shards steady, which became troublesome given his queasiness. The entire process was slow and cumbersome. All the while, Nurse Redheart watched with anxiety written all over her face.
Back at the depot, the express stood by with its new engine (a homebuilt Equestrian engine) while a small van was added to the back of the train. Pinkie Pie and the Cakes were busy loading some of their baked goods onto the van for the express to take to the markets of the surrounding villages. Like the Apple family, the Cakes were known throughout Equestria for their exceptional pastries (the only difference being that the Apple family was known for their produce as well). Pinkie always loaded the van onto the 11:15 express, which was normally pulled by 2398. As she skipped up towards the locomotive to wish the engineer a safe and fun journey, she failed to recognize the new engine now sitting at the head.
“That’s weird,” she said, “2398 always pulls the 11:15. I wonder where he is.” She skipped back towards the van, but instead passed it to get a better look at the roundhouse. Sure enough, she could make out the maroon tender of 2398 sticking out of his stall. Pinkie automatically knew that something was up. Ironside loved his job to a fault, so his engine still sitting in its stall was an indication that something was wrong; very wrong. Worry came over Pinkie, and she began to gallop towards the roundhouse, narrowly avoiding the switching engine in the yard.
Ironside lay down on his bed, still heavily shaken by the day’s events. 2398 and Applejack sat nearby, watching him. No news of Gallow’s condition had been received since the accident, so Ironside still assumed the worst. His mind kept flashing back between the wreck from almost four weeks ago and the incident of today. He even remembered making a promise to Gallow. “Thank you, Mr. Ironside,” he remembered Gallow saying to him. “I hope we meet again someday.”
“We will,” he had responded. “And it will be under much better circumstances. I promise.” Tears began to stream down his face again. “But these aren’t better circumstances,” he whispered to himself. 2398 (though you couldn’t tell) was tearing up as well. He couldn’t bear to see his driver in such a miserable state.
Suddenly, the door to the roundhouse burst open. “Something’s wrong!” Pinkie Pie shouted in a very serious tone.
“I suppose y’all heard the news, then?” Applejack inquired.
“No, but I could sense that something bad must have happened. Otherwise, Ironside wouldn’t be lying on his bed in tears, would he?” replied Pinkie.
“Hey Pinkie,” Ironside responded weakly.
“What happened, Ironside?” she asked. “I’ve never seen you this sad before. Did you run over another little critter that happened to be on the tracks?”
“Pinkamena Diane Pie!” shouted Applejack. “Don’t remind him of that, especially not now!” Pinkie was taken aback by being called by her full name by anyone outside of her parents. Apparently, she had forgotten not to speak of the reason why Ironside was so uncomfortable around Fluttershy.
“Applejack,” she replied. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just…”
“You’re not far off, Pinkie,” Ironside said softly.
“What do you mean?” she asked. It took a while for Ironside to gather up the courage to say it.
“I… I killed… a filly,” he stated with much struggle. He then pointed with his hoof to the buffer beam of his engine. Pinkie looked over, and then gasped. The beam was stained a deep red from colliding with Gallow’s body. Pinkie’s normally poofy hair suddenly dropped down into thick, straight locks.
She slowly turned her head back toward Ironside, who was now staring at the ceiling with a grimace on his face. “You… you actually did,” she whispered to him.
“We aren’t 100% certain,” Applejack cut in. “Photo Finish rushed her to the ER soon after the incident.” Pinkie felt a little relief from that. She gently trotted over to Ironside’s bed and looked him straight in the eye. Then, she smiled at him.
“It was just an accident, Alex,” she said, able to read the guilt on his face like a book. “It’s not your fault.” Ironside let out a soft chuckle as the tears welled up.
“Why must you girls tug my heartstrings so?” he asked.
“That’s what friends do,” Applejack replied. Ironside smiled back at Pinkie.
“You’ve always been our friend,” Pinkie said before Ironside could even ask the question. “The heartstring tugging isn’t going to stop anytime soon.”
“Quite frankly, my dear,” Ironside responded, “I don’t want it to.”