Chapter 2: Railways Are No Good

Butch puttered slowly along the country lanes, pulling Thomas on his trailer behind him. For the most part, their journey towards Crovan's Gate was rather quiet. Butch occasionally glanced back at Thomas, only to sigh once he heard nothing and continued to look onwards at the road ahead of him.

Thomas meanwhile, was too busy thinking about the race with Bertie, as well as his accident earlier. Most of all, he was busy thinking about the passengers, Annie and Clarabel, and all the work on his branchline.

"I don't suppose it will take the Fat Controller that long to find another engine to do the work for you whilst you're being repaired." Butch mused.

"Maybe…" Thomas replied sadly.

Butch honked his horn as he turned left around a corner at Tidmouth Town Square, before heading back onto the main road. As he drove along past several industrial buildings, he and Thomas passed by a large car park, a sign hung over the entrance said 'Sodor Roadways Co.'

Thomas glanced over at the entrance to the car park, but only got a brief glimpse at the vehicles inside before his view became more walls of dull bricks.

At the car park itself, Bulgy was resting in the garage at the back of the lot. Bertie was sitting next to him. There was a second garage opposite them, and in it were some more vehicles. The one on the left was Algy, Bertie's cousin. He was a cheerful blue bus who was the most calm and sensible out of all of the buses owned by Sodor Roadways. He was also the one who would take it upon himself to calm a situation, though with characters like Bulgy and Betty around, this proved to be rather difficult.

The bus next to Algy was the longest out of all of them, and a recent addition to the fleet. Her name was Betty, and she was a white and orange bendy bus. She was certainly quite the oddball, her personality flip-flopping about from overly cheery and friendly one moment, to angry and aggressive the next. Most vehicles tended to stay away from her, though, they tried to stay on her good side whilst working with her.

Bulgy looked like he was about to make a statement or announcement of some sort, but he quickly stopped himself from saying anything once he saw a man walking out of a nearby office wearing a smart suit. This was Mr. Croarie, the man who owned Sodor Roadways.

"Ah, great to see you all here. Just need to check the register to make sure everyone is here and accounted for." Mr. Croarie smiled cheerfully as he pulled out a clipboard with several sheets of paper attached, a ball point pen clasped in his left hand, the clipboard in his right.

"Bertie?" He asked.

"Here, Sir." Bertie replied.

"Algy?"

"Yep, I'm here."

"Bulgy?"

"'Ere." The double-decker bus replied, a little more focused with something on his mind.

"Betty?" Mr. Croarie continued to tick off boxes on the list before looking over at the bendy bus sitting next to Algy.

"I'm here, Sir." She beamed happily, though if it was a genuine smile or not was unclear.

"Excellent! Now, where is Rufus?" Mr. Croarie glanced around, trying to locate another one of his vehicles.

Suddenly, a sharp and strange horn blared out as a dark blue van squealed his tyres before driving into the car park, very nearly denting his front against the brick wall at the end. This was Rufus. Sodor Roadways' main delivery van, driving around Sodor to collect and drop off all sorts of things. Rufus hated both rail and road vehicles alike, the reason for this seemingly being unknown to everyone else except himself.

Rufus slowly reversed and pulled up alongside Mr. Croarie, who glanced up at the van with a frown.

"Traffic held me up." Rufus explained bluntly, glaring at the buses on either side of him grumpily.

"Well…" Mr. Croarie sighed. "At least you're here now. That's something." He puts his clipboard down and looks at all the awaiting road vehicles before him.

"Since Thomas ended up in an accident and has been sent for repairs, I'm going to need some of you to help out on his branchline whilst he is away. Bertie and Bulgy, you will cover passenger work, and Rufus, you can help with goods if need be."

"Yeah, yeah sure…" Rufus muttered, clearly not interested in what anybody else had to say.

As Mr. Croarie walked away back into the nearby office, Bulgy glanced at the other vehicles around him, waiting for the man to leave before he spoke up.

"I think it's high time that road became the main mode of transportation here on Sodor." He chuckled.

Bertie and Algy raised an eyebrow before looking over at Bulgy.

"Not this again, Bulgy?" Bertie groaned with annoyance.

"Think about, Bertie. With Thomas off at the works, the passengers won't have a reliable passenger service to go on the railways for them." Bulgy smirked confidently.

"That doesn't mean it's time to start taking over!" Bertie retorted crossly. "We are supposed to be helping the engines!"

"Who says?" Bulgy harrumphed.

"I says! I-" Bertie began.

"You're just one little bus against everyone else!" Bulgy guffawed with laughter.

Betty laughed along with Bulgy, though her laughing was more maniacal and unstable. Algy raised an eyebrow at her, but didn't say anything.

Rufus just glanced up at Bertie and Bulgy, gave a light titter, before glaring back at the wall.

"What good have those rust buckets ever done for us, eh?" Rufus growls, still a moody expression plastered on his face.

"They help us whenever we need it, we do the same in return!" Algy points out.

"We have to brought in to cover their stupid mistakes and accidents! Idiot tank engine Thomas comes along and crashes into snow because…" Bulgy starts to mock Thomas' voice. "Oh boo hoo, I don't wanna wear my snowplow because I don't like how it feels, wa wa wa!" He has another hard laugh before continuing to speak.

"And who had to come and sort his mistake? You did, Bertie!" Bulgy chuckled.

"But I-" Bertie began to try speaking up but got cut off again.

"What accidents are caused mostly on this island? By the engines of course! It's like there are about three or four accidents on the railway every day!" Bulgy added. "Sometimes, their accidents involve us getting stuck or needing to cover for their mistake!"

"Who's with me?!" Bulgy called to the other vehicles in the car park.

"Got nothing else going on, suppose it's something to do." Rufus mumbled.

"I'm in!" Betty beamed brightly. "Always great to have some work to do!"

"We can start this plan tomorrow!" Bulgy declares to everyone else. "I best be off to tell anyone else who can join us!"

Bulgy immediately kept quiet and put on a smile once he saw another man walk out of the office.

"Bulgy!" The man called to him as he walked over. "Don't suppose you could help out with taking some workmen up the road to Crosby? Their lorry broke down taking them there. Just a short journey with only a few passengers."

"Not a problem, Sir." Bulgy grinned and he began to slowly roll out of his side of the garage, before honking his horn as he pulled out of the car park, but not before flashing a large grin at Bertie before he was out of sight.

"Oh no..." Bertie sighed unhappily, as Algy looked over at him sadly.

Bulgy trundled along the country lanes at a moderate pace, watching the world pass him by.

Further up the road nearby the town of Crosby, George the Steamroller was slowly chugging along, alongside several workmen and a few safety barriers and portable traffic lights. George was an old enemy of the railway. And every time he had interacted with them up to now, he'd only ever found himself in accidents involving some of the engines. He wasn't a particularly friendly character with most people, but he was friendly enough with Bulgy to have a conversation.

Bulgy pulled up nearby the workmen as he sat in the field nearby, and watched George flattening the road.

"How's work for you, George?" Bulgy asked.

"Good." George grunted, not taking his eyes off of his work.

Bulgy waited until their conversation was out of earshot of the workmen before continuing to talk.

"These railway engines are a pain aren't they?" Bulgy chuckled, trying his best to sway George over.

"Yeah. 'Ate 'em." George huffed, continuing to putter along right in front of Bulgy.

"Just imagine if Sodor was an island completely devoid of all railway lines, replaced instead with roads. You could roll around whenever you want, wherever you want, without any stupid engines annoying you." Bulgy smirked.

George became rather intrigued by the sound of this, and looked up from his work, as his speed began to slowly decrease, as he passed Bulgy.

"I like the sound of that." George chuckled.

"Thomas has been sent to the works for repairs due to an accident." Bulgy explained. "Which means that one of the Fat Controller's most useful engines is out of commission. Meaning the passengers on his branch line don't have their main passenger engine service for a while."

"Well, he won't be in the works long I don't think." George mused. "Besides, Fat Controller will find another engine to do the work for 'im soon."

"Yes, but us buses could start to take all of the branch line's passengers for Thomas, even when he comes back. That way, he won't be needed any more. We can then move onto getting rid of all the goods traffic on the line too. And then, all the railway lines can be ripped up, before we move onto the next part of the Island."

George was completely enamoured with Bulgy's plan, his face lit up with joy as he turned back around to flatten another section of the road.

"Brilliant!" George exclaimed. "When can we get started?"

"Tomorrow, I shall start with planning out where the buses will go on Thomas' branchline, before anything else happens." Bulgy replied. "Hopefully, you can tell your other Island Council buddies about this plan?"

George's face turned back to a scowl instantly as he looked down at the road below him.

"Nah. Don't wanna do that." He sniffed. "Them lorries will muck it up somehow and spoil me fun. And as for that new lass, Jasper…"

"Well, perhaps I could do some arranging so that they don't have to work with you on this plan?" Bulgy suggested.

George looked over at the bus and gave a small smile, though still more of a scowl and sighed.

"Yeah, suppose that'll do."

"Right then, well, see you when the plan gets started." Bulgy grinned, as he began to drive slowly away from George and the workmen.

"See you soon, George!" Bulgy called as he drove away into the distance.

"See ya." George replied, looking back over at the road ahead of him and chortled before he began to sing.

"Railways are no good, turn 'em into roads! Pull 'em up, turn 'em into roads!"

He blew his whistle as he trundled down the road, chuckling all the way.

Edward, who was passing by on the railway line right by the road, raised an eyebrow as he passed by George, but said nothing as he went back to pulling his train.

It was the end of the evening at the Sodor Roadways depot, and Bertie was just getting ready to drift off to sleep, however he couldn't stop thinking about what Bulgy had been talking about earlier and felt very worried.

"Psst! Algy!" Bertie hissed over to the blue bus in the garage opposite him as quietly as he could to not disturb anyone else.

"Wh-what?" Algy mumbled, his eyelids drooping slightly as he tried to wake up.

"Why is Bulgy planning on taking over the Island?"

"Dunno. Must be something to do with the fact that Thomas recently derailed. He's always been wanting to prove that road is superior to rails, and I feel like this might be his chance."

Bertie glanced over next to him at the sleeping Bulgy and sighed sadly before he began to go to sleep as well, Algy followed shortly after.

As everyone was sleeping under the dark, starry sky, Bulgy opened one eye and looked around, first at Bertie next to him, then at Betty and Algy opposite them. He chuckled to himself menacingly.

"Good night, railways…" He murmured before going back to sleep along with everyone else.

I apologise for how long this chapter took to be uploaded but I hope I can get these out at a better rate. We've seen and heard of quite a few new characters and plot points in this chapter.

Betty the Bendy Bus - The first of the brand-new characters in this movie, Betty's personality is based on that of Jekyll and Hyde, the reason for this is due to the fact that she is like two buses stuck together. She is a recent arrival on Sodor, and will certainly be helping out Bulgy in his plan.

Algy - Another returning character, Algy retains his design from the annual story 'Bertie to the Rescue' and will get more things to do as the story develops.

Rufus the Delivery Van - Sodor Roadways was described to own some vans, though none have ever been seen, so I made one. Rufus doesn't have that much of a major role in the story, though he will still make several appearances.

The Horrid Lorries - Only a mention here but they will be appearing later on in this story.

Jasper - Once again, only mentioned here, though gets a major role alongside George later on. She will be revealed soon enough.

How will Bulgy's plan start to unfold? Come back soon for Chapter 3 "A Wrong Turn".