Wendy and Dipper desperately tried to get the brake back into action as the locomotive worked twenty-to-the-dozen, rocking wildly as its pistons grew more and more violent. Every gauge and pipe in the engine cab rattled and shook, Wendy's can of Pitt Cola rocking back and forth.

"So they're just tossing themselves into the fire because… that's what they do?!" Wendy barked over the head-pounding sound of the locomotive. "That's crazy!"

"To Valhalla!" another Boggle yelled, throwing itself from the tender. "Finally, my fate lay before me! May my fiery end be a glori-"

CLANG!

Dipper batted the beast off of the footplate with a shovel (and a very loud grunt of exertion), sending it flying outwards and embedding it into a tree.

Pacifica blinked, pretty impressed by the force of Dipper's swing. "Just focus on stopping the train instead of talking about how crazy it is, Wendy!" She barked. "This is only gonna get worse if you don't!"

"I can't find anything! We need some other way to stop the train!" Dipper said, trying to MacGyver a new pin with whatever junk he had in his vest pockets. (Unsuccessfully.)

"Hang on, Dip, lemme check my toolbox!" Wendy said. She didn't get a chance to look. The Boggles, blinded with rage - and the whole, y'know, not having eyes thing - immediately recognised her as a threat, and pounced on the Corduroy daughter in unison as if they were blunder shot.

She yelled a series of expletives at them, trying to shield herself and - to the horror of Dipper and Pacifica - the redhead lost her footing and slipped from the footplate, still with her toolbox in hand, falling backwards and landing in a large bush by the side of the railroad with a painful sounding crunch.

The locomotive was now officially a runaway.

"W-Wendy!" Dipper yelled, almost looking as if he'd jump out himself.

"Guys! Guys, you need to close the fire door when you go into the tunnel!" She yelled back from the rapidly disappearing horizon, before scrambling clear and making a beeline to get help.

On the footplate, things were now going into sheer chaos. Boggles were jumping into the fire, the locomotive only growing fiercer and fiercer as it grew faster and faster. In the midst of it, there were now two kids with absolutely no idea what to do, trapped on board the speeding engine, growing increasingly sweaty as the temperature spiked higher and higher.

Dipper clung to one of the handrails, his still bloodied hand clenching his hat.

"Wh-what did she say?!" Pacifica stammered

"Something about how the fire is jumping out of the funnel, I think?!"

"Do- do you know how to drive a train?"

"Pacifica, do I look like I know how to drive a train?"

"Tr-trains are a nerdy thing, right?! I thought-"

"Paz, trust me, if I could drive a train, I'd be driving the train right now!" Dipper replied. "Help me try to work this out!"

She tried to step forward - only for them both to be rammed against the cab walls as the engine navigated a corner, the centrifugal force practically forcing them together as the machine's wheels screamed against the railhead.

Sparks flew. And it wasn't just due to the sudden, unintended intimacy. The two found themselves holding eachother and clenching their eyes shut, half-expecting the entire 40 ton hulk to go careening off into the forest.

"W-Wendy was trying to make that lever move, right?! It must be the brake!" Dipper asked, trying hard to not get distracted by the fact physics now had them pressed against each other.

"S-sure, but how the hell do we get there and fix it?!"

The wheelbeats grew louder, a single rivet bursting from the backhead and almost skimming Dipper's nose. "I-i have no idea!"

"Well we need to-"

They were drowned out, now, by an even louder sound from the careening engine - the lifting of its safety valves. Now, wooshing a towering pillar of white steam, Number 4.5 desperately tried to release what it could from its over-laboured boiler. It had little effect; Wendy had left the water injectors trickling in from the tank, and the two kids didn't even know what injectors were.

If pressure fell, it quickly rose again. If the boiler made space, it was refilled. If the fire cooled down, there was another Boggle. It was, unequivocally, a hopeless endeavour. At least, until the boiler ran dry entirely.

"P-pass me that book!" Dipper yelled over the increasing mechanical cacophony.

The Northwest heir tried her damndest to reach over as the locomotive continued to tilt precariously over the curve. "I- I'm trying!"

Then, with a horrendous jolt, it fell back onto all of its wheels as the curve straightened out - this time throwing Pacifica to the floor as the forces dropped off. The bell atop the locomotive's boiler clanged incessantly, which did little to calm their frayed nerves. She stumbled over, her grass-stained dress now equally sullied with soot stains - then yelled and threw herself to the floor as more Boggles dove into the flaming furnace.

Flames and sparks belched out in reply, threatening to burn her mane of platinum hair. It was hot. Uncomfortable. With the cab so shielded from the elements, it was easy for heat to only build exponentially around them.

The dark metal of the cab's backhead seemed to be smouldering in a deep, red glow. Hot jets of steam, outsized clumps of cinder, a coating of soot - it was no wonder, Pacifica figured, that the old timey folks seemed to be dirty all of the time. If she had been fascinated by the locomotive earlier, right now she utterly despised it.

She stretched as hard as she could, trying not to freak out over the mess, trying desperately to ignore the jeering shouts and screams of the Boggles that flew overhead. It didn't help that she could see the remains of the one she had freakin' torn open out of the corner of her eye.

It was moments like this, more than ever, that part of her wished to be back within the fine silk enclaves and furnishings of Northwest Manor, in comfortable silence, all of her comforts catered to. The environment she found herself in, now - sweating, ash-stained and singed, surrounded by clagging smoke, damp steam and screaming coalems, was not how she expected to spend the end of August.

Then, her eyes met Dipper's - and any feelings of indignity were quickly replaced with determination. She deflected a boggle with her elbow and snarled. She wasn't going to take this lying down. Literally.

Pacifica Northwest crouched, scooped up the book, then stood up and took on her best defender's pose, squaring her feet to try and stay stable.

"Get out of my space, you stupid, teethy rocks!"

"Attack the one with fake golden hair!"

"Oh, you didn't just-"

Pacifica grunted, booting one of the boggles back as hard as she could - even if it did mean ruining her $300 designer boots.

"I am sick of weirdness threatening me, threatening my family, threatening my friends and threatening my town! " She yelled. "You want some? Come at me, you stupid f-"

She was interrupted by a strange sensation - they felt another shift. It was subtle enough, but they felt it. The locomotive was climbing. Up the steepening gradient into the cliffs.

And towards the Wentworth Bridge.