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joezworld · 4 years ago

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Fools in Love (8/10)

Double Date, Quadruple Header

1980

"And the last item on the agenda..." said the inspector as he assigned locomotives to trains. "There is a series of special trains going to Suddery from the mainland on this coming Sunday. 46 040, you and 35 102 will take the morning arrivals, and more engines will be assigned at a later time."

"Wow," said Delta with a healthy dose of sarcasm and faux cheer - she didn’t like this inspector and his clear bias towards steam engines. A special train from him could easily be carrying garbage. "A special! Is it a special special, or is it a really special special?"

"I hope it's a special special special, with special carriages." Bear said with equal sarcasm. "Then everything will be specially special!"

"Special has ceased to be a real word now." Duck said in a small voice while the inspector glared over the top of his spectacles.

"You will find out on Sunday." He said firmly. "Now get to work."

Bear and Delta arrived at Barrow on the front of separate trains - the Limited and the Express, to find the yard in disarray.

A seething Class 08 was shuttling back and forth while the trucks laughed at him. Bear, who had arrived second, watched as Delta didn't even try to help, and instead was mocking the 08 as he hurled insults at her, the trucks and the coaches.

This didn’t make the shunter any happier, and he began bumping and banging coaches until a particularly bold rake of third class carriages slipped their brakes on and refused to move an inch, trapping the disagreeable shunter deep inside a siding.

To make matters worse, none of the cars for the "incredibly special specials" had arrived yet. The trains were late arriving in Barrow, and the Yard Master was tearing out what little of his hair remained.

Noon arrived, and so did Edward, bringing a train of ballast wagons from Arlesburgh. "Oliver failed." He gasped, not having been remotely ready for a cross-island jaunt on a heavy train. "So this missed Bear's goods and- oh, hello Bear."

Bear grimaced. "There hasn't been a goods train yet - I'm still waiting on my special."

"Oh." Edward paled. "Well that would explain why BoCo was so frantic."

Bear and Delta winced. If a freight train was canceled it was usually folded into the next pick-up goods; BoCo was probably having to flat-shunt a quarter mile long train at each station, the poor engine.

After having a drink, Edward was drafted into helping out in the yard, and was soon sorting out the mess, although he did leave the 08 in the yards until last - the third class coaches had some choice words for him, and they were not brief!

At this point, BoCo finally arrived, or rather, his train did - Toad the brakevan was on the leading end, while a plume of steam wafted into the air from near the back.

"Mister BoCo had engine troubles." Toad explained. "So we left him at the works and Mister Henry had to push. His passengers aren’t pleased about that!"

They weren't. As Edward and the 08 sorted the massive train, the passengers swarmed out of the coaches, unsure of who to be upset at but hopping mad nonetheless.

"We've surely missed our connection!" They shouted at the stationmaster, who wrung his hands before telling them that the connection hadn't even arrived yet!

"There’s been a signal failure further up the line, " he said nervously. "So no train has been able to get through."

Strangely, this didn’t make the passengers any calmer, and Henry was forced to retreat to the sheds to escape their ire.

"Well, I suppose that this day can only get worse..." he muttered darkly as he looked out onto the empty BR line leading inland.

"What makes you say that?" Delta asked, not particularly upset that her "special" was late.

"The concert will be delayed!" Henry cried. "And I was rather looking forward to it - it isn't every day that you get to be tour support for Led Zeppelin!"

"What?" Bear was shocked. "Led Zeppelin is coming to Sodor?"

"Yes," Henry explained. "They're going to the Suddery fairgrounds. They did a show in Germany a few days ago, and they're coming here by train. I’m taking them."

"Really? The Suddery fairgrounds?" Edward asked as he shunted the last of the coaches into place. "But there's barely a gazebo there. How will they perform? It's all muddy!"

"I don't know how they plan on doing it, but my driver is certainly quite eager." Henry looked over at his driver, who was wearing an old band t-shirt over his normal work clothes.

"Make fun all you want, but I will get an autograph!" He yelled at Henry, who rolled his eyes.

"He's been like that all day."

---------

Several hours later, and the special trains still hadn't made an appearance. The stationmaster had attempted to quell the now-riotous passengers by showing a list of delayed trains to them, which did nothing but scare away Edward, who took one look at the large list of delayed goods trains and realized that the lazy 08 would try and make him shunt all of them. When nobody was looking, his crew connected him to an empty stock train and left for Peel Godred, leaving the 08 to have to work for a change.

And not a moment too soon. Edward has just barely disappeared into the distance when the BR home signal dropped, and a pair of furious Class 37s roared into the yard. Too angry for words or help, they banged and slammed their train into a siding by themselves, growled at the 08 as he brought their next train up, and seethed into the distance as fast as their wheels would carry them.

"That was ominous..." Henry said as the home signal dropped again to allow the next train into the yard.

It was... For the next 45 minutes, the yard was practically besieged by train after angry BR train - some over 4 hours late - who raced into the yard, dropped their wagons or disembarked their passengers, picked up new ones, and raced away again. The poor 08 was losing his mind as goods wagons built up around him. The three Sudrians couldn't even help - their shed was on the opposite side of the main line from the yard, and there was no time in between trains for them to wade into the fray and assist. Eventually, as a harried looking DMU rattled across the bridge to Sodor on a through train to Norramby, Bear and Delta were allowed across the main line to pick up their specials from the yard.

Bear had been given a short line of funny-looking vans, while Delta had a longer string of flatcars carrying lumpy shapes covered in tarpaulins.

Problems emerged before they were even coupled up.

"These hoses don't fit." Said one of the men as he tried to connect the brake pipes on Bear's wagons.

Several more attempts were made before the problem was found: the vans were from Germany, and used air brakes, while the two diesels used British vacuum brakes. Neither system was compatible with the other, which meant that this train would have to go without brakes.

An inspection of Delta's wagons revealed that they were also German, and had similar brake lines.

"How are there two separate trains from Germany?" Delta asked. "Why didn't they keep them together when they got off the ferry?"

"Ve took two different ferries." Snapped the lead flatcar. "Und ve vere suppozed to be hier three hourz ago!"

Hauling an unbraked train was not a huge issue - it merely required more care and a brake van - but a much bigger issue arose when a search for brake vans found only Toad.

"Well that’s torn it," Bear said. "We can't share a brakevan unless we double head our train, and I don’t know where we're even going with these."

"Actually, Mister Bear," Toad interjected as the yardmaster frantically flipped through his train orders to see if the situation could be salvaged. "If you are double-heading two normal length trains, you would need two brake vans then, to counter-act the increased weight. Standard practices." He paused to inspect the train.

"And that's enough wagons that I would recommend a second van and a second engine in the name of safety."

The yardmaster cursed and threw his clipboard to the ground - all of these special trains were going to the same station and he still didn’t have enough vans!?

"Toad, does it have to be brakevans?" Henry called from the platform. His special train had arrived on the back of the most recent passenger train, and unlike the other specials, it was fully braked. "Could we just put it on the back of my train?"

Toad inspected the train - three Pullman carriages and a baggage car. "It's very unusual Mister Henry, but it should just work!"

The unusual cavalcade was quickly assembled - Henry and his coaches, then Bear, his wagons, Delta's wagons, Delta herself, and then Toad. This ensured that the unbraked wagons wouldn't slam together and cause trouble, while also providing enough braking power for the entire train.

The unusual makeup of the train attracted the attention of its passengers as well, and the members of Led Zeppelin came out to look at what was going on.

"You know that Rod is going to lose it when he hears about this?" One of them remarked.

"Oh yeah he will. That paint's not prototypical, oh no!" Another man with long blond hair said mockingly as he snapped pictures of Delta and Toad.

"Hey!" Said Delta. "My paint looks amazing!"

The rocker held his hands up. "I mean no disrespect, it's just that one of our friends is into really accurate model trains, and he's going to flip when he sees these pictures!"

"Oh," Delta blushed a little. "Well make sure to get my good side, which is all of my sides!"

The man laughed as he went down the platform to get more pictures.

"Excuse me, Mister Plant?" Toad asked as he came near. "Will you be performing Stairway at tonight's show?"

Robert Plant blinked. "Why yes we are! Are you a fan?" He asked the brake van.

"A little bit sir."

"Well I'll be! We have fans everywhere!"

---

Eventually, the strange train rumbled out of Barrow yard and across the bridge into Sodor.

It was slow going - they were using the path cleared for Henry's train, and it had been timetabled for a much faster speed than the unbraked wagons were allowed to travel at.

By the time they had arrived at Kildane, they were running quite behind even the most generous schedule, and had to wait for other trains to pass.

The electric branch had just received new electric locomotives, but they were nowhere to be seen. Edward was there however, sitting in the yard with a dazed look on his face.

"They're very chatty." He said, sounding quite overwhelmed.

After waiting at the station for about ten minutes, the station master came out and spoke to Henry's driver.

"We need this train taken to Suddery." he said, pointing to a line of ten wagons loaded with aluminum.

"You do know this is a special, right?" Henry’s driver protested. "We can't stop to pick up more cars at every station! Have Edward do it!"

"He can't. Whatever foul-up the mainland is doing has thrown off the schedule for the entire region. There isn't another path until nightfall.” He paused. “You'd probably need to take Edward with you as well, considering that he needs to be in Wellsworth by four."

The stationmaster had phrased this like a request, but it was actually a demand, and so the unusual train got even longer, with Edward and the (thankfully braked) wagons now in front of Henry. On the platform, the members of Led Zeppelin were taking a huge number of photographs, and one - Henry thought his driver had said his name was Jimmy - was at a payphone on the platform, describing the train to a friend. From the sounds of it, the friend was very displeased at the amount of work it would take to recreate this scene on his model railway.

After leaving Kildane, there were mercifully no more stops until Wellsworth, where Edward was uncoupled from the train.

Henry quickly realized that there was a problem as he tried to move the train out of the yard. "I can't see anything!" He called back to his driver.

It was true. The wagons stretched so far in front of Henry that it made seeing the rails ahead almost impossible.

Considering that all the aluminum wagons and the Pullman coaches were vacuum braked, it was decided to uncouple Henry and put him in front of the wagons.

This plan was working well, until:

"The coupling is stuck!" Shouted Sean the driver from between Henry and the lead coach.

The coupling links had jammed together at some point, and it would take heavy tools to separate them - heavy tools that weren't on hand, and more importantly, would have broken the links on the chain, meaning that they wouldn’t be able to couple the train back up again!

To make matters worse, neither of the diesels could be attached, as the station at Wellsworth had a single track leading onto the branch from the main line, with the yard beyond it. There was no way for either diesel to reach the front of the train.

Henry, having accepted that this day was going to be one of the longest ones in his life, sighed. "Am I just going to have to go very slow then? Will Led Zeppelin still be popular by the time we get to Suddery?"

"Very funny." His driver said as he tried to think of another way. "We can't even do that - we'd end up delaying Edward's commuter train, and that's about the only thing that hasn't been late tod-"

He was cut off as James clattered into the yard tender-first. "Those menaces at the docks blocked the turntable!" He growled as he was uncoupled from a rake of China Clay wagons, leaving little doubt as to the identity of the menaces.

"Good to see you too James." Henry chuckled at his friend's distress.

"Gah! Henry? What are you doing here!" James yelped. He hadn’t seen Henry.

"Oh you know, just being incredibly late."

"Well don't let me stop you, Old Square Wheels."

"Oh you won't be a bother," Henry said as an idea flew into his smokebox. "Actually, you might be able to help us..."

James had no idea who Led Zeppelin was, and quite frankly didn't care, but once Delta shouted at him to show a wheel, he quickly agreed to pilot the train, and they were soon underway.

Suddery fairgrounds had its own sidings and platforms, used for when the annual livestock show takes place, and the train was unloaded in short order. James quickly shunted the aluminum wagons to the goods depot, and then he, Toad and the other engines watched as the lumps under the tarpaulins were revealed to be parts of a massive stage that was rapidly assembled by men who came pouring out of the coaches. Then massive speakers were pulled out of the enclosed wagons, while a number of wheeled cases were removed from the baggage car.

The band, feeling somewhat superfluous, waited near the engines. Bear and Henry felt bad that they weren't bigger Led Zeppelin fans, but were comforted in the fact that they at least knew something about the band, unlike some engines they knew.

Toad, meanwhile, had proved that he was a blatant liar - there was nothing 'little' about his fan status, and he knew more about some songs than the band themselves!

Eventually, the stage was built, and the band retreated from the platform to go do a sound test.

The stage was quite close to the platforms, and nobody had been allowed into the venue yet, meaning that:

"Do you lot have any requests?" Shouted Robert Plant over the speaker system.

"IMMIGRANT SONG!" Toad roared before any of the engines could even open their mouths.

Night fell over the fairground, and Bear was thankful that none of them were needed for other duties - the fairground was charged with an almost electric atmosphere, and it felt like something special was going to happen.

He looked to Henry at his right, and James and Delta at his left, and realized something else.

"I think," He said slowly. "That this is technically our first date."

"You're right." Henry said with shock. "It's taken us three years, but you're right."

"And ours too..." said Delta quietly. "Jamie, isn't that great? We managed to go on a date!"

James blinked slowly. "Yes we did. And it's a double date at that. By accident no less. We certainly don't do things by half measures!"

He grinned. "If this concert is half as good as that last song, it might be the best first date ever."

"Oh it will be Mister James!" Shouted Toad, who was choosing to ignore whatever the engines were talking about in favor of watching the band tune their instruments.

The concert began shortly after 9:30, only slightly behind its posted start time.

The band came out to thunderous applause, and Jimmy Page made the introductions to the audience.

"I just want to thank you all for coming out here tonight - back in 1972, we said that we'd come out here and do a show during our last tour of the United Kingdom, but things happened, and we never made it out here. We said we'd come back, and we never go back on our promises! Even if it takes eight years!"

He paused as the audience applauded once again. "And I also want to give a special thanks to some of our audience tonight. We almost didn't make it here tonight because of some trouble with the train, but those engines back there," he pointed to Henry, Bear, Delta, and James. "Worked like mad to get us here safely and on time, so this first song is dedicated to you!"

The band immediately began playing a hard and heavy rock song. It was an incredibly powerful piece, and the engines looked at each other with glee - this was going to be a hell of a night.

Later

As Since I've Been Loving You echoed over the fairgrounds, James quietly whispered to Bear.

"Is this what it feels like for you?"

Bear looked over at James. Even while he directly speaking to another engine, his eyes were glued to Delta, who was enraptured by the music.

"Yes." Bear whispered back. He knew what James meant.

The end of the concert was approaching - or so the engines hoped, considering it was almost midnight. Kashmir had taken quite a long time, and while Toad may have been having the time of his life, the engines were feeling the late hour a bit more.

"And this song I want to dedicate - dedicate to a little brake van out there in the train yard," Robert Plant said into the microphone. "Cause he asked for it by name, which means that we've officially got fans everywhere!"

A very recognizable guitar riff began while Toad squeaked in delight.

Henry and Bear looked at each other, and then looked over at James and Delta. The night could go on for a little bit longer - it wasn’t often you got to see someone hear Stairway to Heaven for the first time.

#ttte #music #sodor #sodor shenangians #led zeppelin #ttte henry #ttte james #ttte edward #ttte bear #OC: Delta #ttte toad #this was the last LZ concert ever #hell of a first date #fools in love #fic #headcanon #long

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