Ah...this episode exists...I don't know how to feel about this episode. Bill and Ben are fun, but the episodes that focused on them post-movie and pre-Andrew Brenner never really connected with me. Feel free to disagree, that's fine. It's still good, but it doesn't really have anything to make it really stand out. Even the one change (Ben's buffers) doesn't stick with their next appearance.
On a more cheerful note, I have begun work on one of the stories I mentioned a while back showing one of the universes from Magic Railroad. Chances are I'll probably release it on Tales of the Abridgement, so look out for that when it comes out!
One last thing: The Jack and the Pack spin-off will be covered in this fanfic, after Season 6. Why? Because I want to have a direct run from Season 7 to Season 8, and that's the only other place I could reasonably put them. Hope that's fine with you!
Guest: You're not the only one.
AaronCottrell97: I CAN CONFIRM OR DENY NOTHING. Heh. I am cruel, aren't I?
Reality Rejection Service: That it would. But, for those Not-Gordon fans out there, there will be a reckoning coming.
Kamen Rider Necrom: Thanks!
Bronze Shield: This and Season 7 really went all out with crashes. It's a lot of fun to write.
Game-Watch: I'm surprised no one comments on that more.
MattPrice01: I'm really glad that I got to cheer you up! I hope things get better with your friend. You keep that inquisitive face of yours on...you won't have long to wait.
UGX7: Most of those errors were fixed! Again, apologies. Some episodes you just want to be done with, you know? It'll take a while for there to be some sort of reckoning with all of this, but it is coming. The end will be explained by the final episode of the season.
Hughie96: ...Welllllll, can't say anything just yet, can I? XD
CUE THE THEME!
All right what's on the schedule for today- OH SHIT IT'S THE BILL AND BEN EPISODE.
Yes. It's that time of the season again, where we basically shove all the characters that you actually care about into the background and focus on these two hobgoblins in engine form. Bill and Ben are, in case you have been living in a cave for most of your life, quarry engines and pieces of human excrement given life. They are also twins. I guess because our audience SOLELY consists of blind goldfish now. YOU HEAR THAT EVERYONE! Y'ALL ARE A BUNCH OF BLIND GOLDFISH!
...Sorry. Got a little...American, there.
They play together, they shunt trucks together and get up to naughty tricks together. It is, quite honestly, getting really old by this point. So old that Mavis is beginning to wonder if she shouldn't do a BoCo and get herself killed just to get an easy day. Wherever you find Bill, you'll find Ben. Wherever you find Ben, you'll find Bill. And whenever you find water, you will get wet. All of these things are true.
One day, in December, the Fat Controller came to inspect the quarry engines. Mavis and Bill were in fine working order, apart from the many nerouses that Mavis had picked up from having to live at the quarry in that time.
"Unfortunately for you, Ben, YOUR TIME IS UP!"
"HOORAY!" said everyone on the Island not named Bill or Ben.
"Your buffers are damaged, you must go to the works and have them mended properly!"
"Harroo." said everyone on the Island not named Bill or Ben.
"Mavis, you're going to have to work with Bill until Ben gets better."
"Yes...Yes sir!" sobbed Mavis, smiling on the outside and screaming on the inside. And the Fat Controller drove away, as Toby entered the yard to provide moral support for the rather stressed out diesel.
"I am going to get new buffers! So...nah-nah-nah-na!"
"Oh piss off!" snapped Bill, hurt that he wasn't getting special buffers instead. Mavis mentally wondered if Kelly was onto something with this 'killing yourself' lark. "I SHOULD GET NEW BUFFERS TOO! WAAAAAH!" At which point, Bill began whining and crying like a rather spoilt brat, and yet another thread of Mavis's sanity was yanked away from the tapestry that was her mind. "WE ARE TWINS! We do everything together! Didn't you hear what the narrator was saying only seconds ago!?"
"But you don't need new buffers! So there!"
"You're only getting those bloody buffers because you're such a careless sod! I saw the way that you left that gunpowder out just for kicks!"
"AM NOT!"
"Are too!"
"AM NOT!"
"Are too!"
"Will the two of you shut the hell! Stop being such grouchy crabby prats! Bill, we've got work to do, and the less time I have to spend with you, the better!" And off Mavis stormed, Bill following in a disgruntled manner. Ben couldn't wait.
As Ben passed by, Bill watched with growing envy. As in, he was literally turning green. No one was aware that that was an actual thing that happened. At which point, he threw up after the long boozer he had been on the night before. That made a little bit more sense.
As he returned to work, and after the crew had mopped up the mess, all he could think about was Ben's beaming buffers. This was becoming incredibly ridiculous, even by the twins standards. He was so busy thinking on this, that he promptly rang smack bang into a wall with a single truck. "OOOOOH...why'd you put buffers here of all places?!"
The foreman offered no explanation at all. As Bill waited, a pipe that had been resting on the roof slid down and smacked Bill right in the funnel. "Well this is just rid-rid-aaaaaaaaaah...aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah...choooooooooooooooo!"
The pipe flew into the air. A few minutes later, Edward let out a loud "OW!" as it hit him on the head. This did not improve his mood.
"Be careful!" snapped Mavis, currently looking into Buddhism to calm herself down. "And stop thinking about Ben's buffers!"
"I wasn't until you just brought it up! OHHHHHH THAT BEN! HE'S A BASTARD!"
Bill did try that day. He thought about birds. And trees. And anything else. But usually that lead him back to the same thought. Namely that smug grinning bastard that was Ben.
...
"I want new buffers too!" said Bill, after throwing himself angrily at a bunch of rather bored trucks.
"You've been so subtle about it, how on earth did you expect me to guess that, oh woe oh woe, how could I have too deaf to your lamentations and your issues with all things buffer related."
"...Was that sarcasm, Mavis?"
"Nah. It was just me stating the facts...yes, it was sarcasm. Just be glad you're in good working order!"
"I DON'T CARE, YOU'RE WRONG AND I'M RIGHT, IT'S NOT FAIR!"
One wheesh later, Mavis spat quarry dust and soot out of her mouth and glared at the small tank engine. "Bill." she said, preparing for a rather long rage.
"Oops?"
Even after Mavis went off on a massive rant about how stupid Bill was being, he was still struggling to forget his desire. The Troublesome Trucks wouldn't let him do so. "Poor, poor Bill, he works and suffers, while his jackass bro Ben gets brand new buffers!"
"I think they're losing their touch." said Mavis.
"SCREW YOU!" snapped Bill.
"On the other hand..."
"I MAY NOT HAVE BRAND NEW BUFFERS, BUT AT THE VERY LEAST...A: I AM NOT A BASTARD LIKE BEN. AND B, I KNOW HOW TO BIFF A TRUCK!" And he raced backwards. Mavis, who had heard from Duck what happened to Donald a few weeks ago, could see history repeating itself.
"No, stop, come back."
One loud crash later, Bill had landed awkwardly at the bottom of a slope. "Well, who could have seen this coming?"
"I could have." Mavis said dryly. "Now, let me just get you help. Therapy would be a good place to start, I reckon." She paused. "Oh, wait, it's the bastard...er, Ben. To the rescue."
"BUST MY BUFFERS!"
"I think you have! ...Mavis, do you get the joke? Because he was whining about his buffers!"
"I got it, Ben."
"And...And we say Bust our Buffers a lot!"
"I understand the joke, Ben."
"AND I'VE GOT NEW BUFFERS-"
"Yep."
"...So, why aren't you laughing?"
"Oh. You know. Ton of reasons. Get him out of there quick."
...
Unsurprisingly, when the Fat Controller arrived and saw the state of Bill's buffers, he was not happy." DISHGRACEFUL!" He said, slurring his words once more. "YOU 'AVE BEHAVED BADLY! DO YOU 'AVE ANYTHING TO SAY FOR YOURSELF!?"
"It...was worth it?"
"Try again!"
"I'm sorry sir."
"Before I give you what you want in new buffers, I want you to think about what it means to be a responsible and reliable engine! Since being Really Useful is too late for you, apparently!"
"Yes sir."
After the Fat Controller had stormed off in a sulk, Ben rolled up to Bill with his new buffers gleaming.
"Nice."
"Thanks...I've been told to say that I'm sorry I teased you."
"Yeah. And I've been told to say that I was naughty too!"
"Of course you were! We're twins!"
"AHAHAHAHAHA what does that have to do with anything, I ask you?"
Elsewhere, Toby and Mavis watched as the two of them got into an argument (An argument that ended with Ben loosing said nice clean buffers) and looked knowingly at each other."Was I ever that bad?"
Toby smirked. "No, of course not."
"Ah, that's good to know."
"If you can believe it, you were worse."
"Oh shut up, you fusspot!"
"Back at you, you idiot!"
"..."
"...
"It's been too long, hasn't it?"
"We must do this more often."
...
"You okay?"
"Just...just dandy. I'm fine." Edward was not looking fine, in Duck's opinion. And not just because of the large bruise from a random pipe falling from the sky that covered his forehead, either. But he figured that saying that out loud would set the blue engine off something fierce, so he didn't remark on that. "I'm not entirely sure why it is you've brought me along with you."
"...Last time I came here, I supposedly got my mind completely zapped of the events of up to a week. That was with someone who didn't know what he was doing. You, on the other hand, are far cleverer than he. Hopefully you can give me a nudge if something like that is tried. And also because work is the best antidote to sorrow, and all that."
"Snow's falling." remarked Edward, as they waited in the yard.
"Indeed. And it's actually December. At last. Hopefully we won't get snow for a fair bit now." There was a pause, and then Duck decided to broach a rather delicate subject. "You know...Gordon does care about you."
"Does he?" Edward sounded bored. Listless.
"Yes. He doesn't do the best job...or any job, of showing it, but I think he does."
"You should have been here in the 50's. I once tried flirting with this one engine, just to see if I could. And it was going well. Yoink. Gordon scoots in and gets her dancing with him before I can even broach the topic. And he made me pay for their drinks."
"Ouch."
"Yep. And then there was that time that he put my name down on a contract he signed for merchandise. I had to pay that particular company well over a hundred pounds just to be released from said contract! ...And that one time he decided to tape over all the recorded episodes of 24 that I had on me just so that he could get in more of his ridiculous training videos."
"Thank god Oliver's kept a back up stash of that. On the edge of- Hello...there she is."
As she entered, Duck marveled at the Duchess's gleaming coat of paint, her rather stoic expression...and then he looked at the bags under her eyes, the clear sign of exhaustion in the way she moved and the way her lips appeared to occasionally twitch. "She's...changed." He murmured.
"People do that, Duck. And engines, too."
"...Montague. It is...interesting, to see you again."
"Duchess. I'd like some answers."
She paused, looked at Edward (Who stared right back at her, as politely as he could in the circumstances) and sighed. "I shall do what I can."