AND IT'S DONE. IT'S DONE IT'S DONE IT'S DONE. VICTORY FOR TOONGUY, HE'S DONE IT. ...Ahem. Keep reading until the very end of this chapter and hey, we're going to get into FUN STUFF NEXT TIME. I hope. XD.

AaronCottrell97: Yep.

Reality Rejection Service: You're not actually that far off. XD.

Bronze Shield: THANK. GOD.

Game-Watch: He's lived on the Island of Sodor for too long. Yeah, you and me both.

MattPrice01: Because you are a logical human being who knows Top Gear well. XD.

JD145: :D

UGX7: I'm very conflicted on the matter. On the one hand, WOW THEY ACKNOWLEDGED IT. On the other hand, HOW LONG HAS HE BEEN SENTIENT FOR!?

Radical sandwiches: *nods sagely*

Kamen Rider Necom: I guess...I did it first.

Acehoneycomb: I have plans! ...Mwahahaha.

CUE THE...less than impressive theme music.

"What do ye mean 'we're not getting a full series', ye bitch!? YE PROMISED US-" Britt put down the phone and let Miss Jenny rant on for the next hour.

She was too tired to even bother with this woman.

Carlin had the same feeling. It had been fun the first two times. Now it was getting depressingly obvious how little she respected him. He still hadn't got a clean pair of pants back.

This was it.

This was the day when he ended it all.

After all, what could go wrong?

...

"Oh, do I really have to go out and shoot? In this weather?!"

"Yes."

"Ohhhhhhhh cripes."

It was a miserable day on the Island of Sodor. Rain lashed down, and the entire Island appeared to have become muddy overnight. So gripping the rails was even harder than it usually was. Thomas was glad he didn't have to work in the mud like Miss Jenny's lot. But he was still being dragged out of his nice warm shed for some stupid reason, and being forced to sit around and wait for shenanigans to happen.

The machines were, in this case, digging up some foundations for the new dairy barn. One would wonder why, but then again, not much thought went into the general planning of the Island in general.

This meant digging up mud.

A lot of it.

Isabella was having a nightmare. "Gross. Gross. Ughhhhh, so gross!" She growled as she began to slalom around the holes and puddles like an expert. Get her paint dirty? Never!

"HURRY, HURRY, HURRY UP!" said Not-Muck. "You always take the slooooooow route around, you boring person!"

"Excuse me, I take the clean way around. And at least I look fairly presentable!"

"Something I-...Hang on." Alfie frowned as his engine spluttered, groaned, did three backflips and then died painfully. "HELP! Oh! IS THIS DEATH!?"

At which point, Max and/or Monty, Oliver, Byron (Still grinning, by the by, for some reason) and Jack spluttered, staggered and stopped. Trevor, meanwhile, shouted in earnest for someone to let him out of the large shed. This prank had officially ceased to be funny.

"NO MORE BUCKET BOUNCING FOR ME." wailed Jack.

"Without more of that fecking good shit, we're all fecked! ...Oh, and also the petrol, I suppose. The farmers will have me guts for fancy hairnets if we don't keep their fecking cows happy! Foreman! Get the fuel trucks on the line, and tell them to hurry the feck up, or I'll skin their legs and make them into fine silk stockings for me niece!"

"Uh, yes, that's...not going to happen."

"Ye'd be surprised how easy it is to skin someone!"

"No, I meant...wait, what? ...Er, anyway, the fuel truck's broken down. Pretty convenient if you ask me.

"FECK. FEEEEEECK. ...Get me the Fat One!"

...

"Thomas, fuel. Get it to Miss Jenny now. She said that apparently there's quite a lot of fat that she can take off and still keep me alive. I'm not testing her today." Hatt looked pale. Thomas sympathized immensely. "I gather something's going wrong."

"Oh, imagine that!" crowed Gordon. Henry and James ignored this and carried on working, determined to not be dragged into this mess.

Thomas sighed. "Fine. FINE. Of course, sir. ...Salty, what are you doing here?"

"Aaaaar! Getting in me cameo for thar season, lad! Gotta get an extra hundred on me contract! Ain't that so, Polly?"

"RAWK!"

"Smart." Thomas muttered in grudging appreciation, and set off.

...

"Good thing the fecking steamers don't use diesel!"

"Uh, that's actually our word." said Isabella, nervously.

"Just for that, yer're going to go off and meet up with that sparkly blue prat in tights, Thomas. Off with ye! And be careful! Ye're worth a lot to me...literally. Like Nigel was."

"Ta." said Isabella, grumpily, ignoring the threat completely.

"Or you could just let me out." growled Trevor. Everyone ignored him. As she gritted her gears, Isabella set off for the destination they had agreed on, Cronk Station was not an awfully long way to go, she supposed. She paused as she saw the open road.

It was flooded.

"Oh, you better worship me like a Queen for this!" she growled, and slowly chugged on through the water. Every lapping of water against her side made her feel like she was about to throw up. However, at last, she forced herself through.

"Well, I hope that's the last of-"

She paused as she looked at where there had once been a road, which now appeared to just be a seething mass of mud.

"-it."

...

Thomas was steaming as fast as he could to meet Isabella, who was trundling along at a similar speed. Both wanted to get this over with as soon as enginely possible.

Then Isabella saw someone standing there.

"STOP! There's been a mudslide, the road's been blocked-"

"Sir Topham Hatt? Why are you dressed up like a policeman?"

"...I'm...I'm not Sir Topham Hatt."

"Really."

"No, of course I'm not! I...I'm a real policeman! ...You never saw this!" And he jumped over a bush, ran away and didn't mention the incident again.

Isabella blinked. "Weird." She sighed. "Okay. So that way's blocked...so we're going to have to go through that field."

She looked at the field. It looked, to be blunt, like someone had a grudge against it and had taken revenge on it in a very gory way. Isabella swallowed. "I hate this." she said to no one in particular.

The next few minutes were quite possibly the most agonizing moments in Isabella's life. Mud clung to her like limpets clinging to rocks, every so often her wheels slipped and skidded, a few times they even sank into the mud completely. And all the while, she came up with a little mantra that she repeated over and over again.

"I HATE MY LIFE. I HATE IT. I HATE IT."

But she wouldn't give up. She was completely knackered by the time she pulled into Cronk Station and staggered besides Thomas, who looked at her in alarm.

"Isabella! You...are you all right?"

"NO. NO I AM NOT." She was on the verge of a complete breakdown. "I'm only just hanging on so please just give me the frigging barrels!"

They were hurriedly removed and slapped onto her back. She was off like a shot.

...

"Well this is fun!" snapped Kelly.

"Eeny-meenie-miney-mo-"

"Oh piss off, Alfie." said a weary Oliver. He couldn't even reach to grab just one single bong. Truly these were dark times.

...

The journey back was just as fun for Isabella. She happened to crash through three pig-stys, a ruck carrying compost and one or two minor flash floods. And as she arrived, she was keenly aware that she was making a terrible squelching and rattling sound. She did not, however, possess anything left of her pride to give a single f*ck.

So she arrived. The dirtiest, muddiest steam lorry ever seen.

"Isabella?!" cried Alfie.

"Ye made it. Ye're late." Soon the machines were refueled and back at work, doing whatever it was they did. And poorly, at that. "Well, ye did...meh. Job well done, and that."

"I KNEW SHE'D DO IT. WHICH IS WHY I DIDN'T TELL YOU THAT I KNEW." bragged Jack.

"Feel proud?"

"I want a wash-down." said Isabella bluntly.

"...Eh. Feck. Nah. Got work to be doing."

"...Excuse me?"

"Ye heard."

"...Right. Well seeing as this is the worst possible day that I've ever had, let me just say what I've wanted to say for the past few decades. You are an awful human being."

"...Ex...Excuse me?"

"YOU HEARD. ...You run this company poorly. More than poorly in fact because at least with Sir Topham BLOODY Hatt, there is the option of THERAPY. All you've done since you took over is shove down that mantra of 'safety first' down our shitting throats! And then you don't even stay CONSTANT ON IT! YOU CALL OUT HALF OF US FOR ONE THING, AND THEN YOU REWARD THE OTHER HALF FOR DOING THE EXACT SAME FLIPPING THING! Oh, and don't even get me started on how SHODDILY this thing is run! Look at the equipment! IT LOOKS LIKE IT WAS MADE IN THE, to borrow a catchphrase here, FECKING FIFTIES! Do you have any idea how much quicker we'd be if we actually had access to ACTUAL EXPLOSIVES?! Or digital shit?! OR...ANYTHING!? But no. NO. OUR OPERATORS ARE FULL OF CRAP. MUCH LIKE YOU. And for the record, screaming at us and using FECK FECK FECK IS NOT. A. PRODUCTIVE. WAY. TO. DO. SHIT. Now I'm going back to the Yard with Kelly. We're going to wash down and then we're going to put a movie on! YOU CAN DO WHATEVER THE HELL YOU WANT! KISS MY EXHAUST PIPE, YOU PATHETIC DRIED UP TWAT!"

And with that, Isabella flounced out, followed moments later by a rather dazed Kelly.

Miss Jenny was, for the first time in her life, completely speechless.

"...So is this a bad f**king time to say that I'd like to break up with you?" said Carlin, awkwardly.

...

"You feel better about yourself now, Carlin?"

"Yes, Percy." said Carlin, holding his broken nose together with a grin as wide as the Cheshire Cat's. "Yes I do."

...

THE PRESENT.

"HOW DO WE GET OUT OF THIS!?"

"I know what to do!" said Oliver. "I shall defuse it with my arm!"

"...At this point, we have little other option." muttered Nelson, angrily. He hated relying on Oliver for anything. Even on good days. Which to be fair, there weren't much of recently.

"All right. Okay. Right. I can do this. Yes. This is it. The moment. I see. So that's how it works. Ah ha. Oh ho. I get it now. This is good. I know where I'm going with this. I am almost there. Uh huh. Indeed."

"...So are you actually going to touch it at any point?"

At which point, Clarkson cut out the middle man and-

Well...let's see if you are smart.

Jeremy Clarkson.

Plus one bomb.

Plus a hammer in his hand.

You can join the dots from there.

...

SOMEWHERE ON THE ISLAND OF SODOR.

"Mavis?"

Mavis glanced at Toby through sleep ridden eyes. "Hmm?"

"City's on fire."

"...Huh."

"Bill and Ben are definitely locked in the sheds?"

"Uh huh."

"Then it's not our problem."

,,,,,

Luckily for all involved, the bomb was of the cartoon variety, and it resulted in only two things. One, blowing Von Stig over the channel, and two, leaving everyone involved covered in soot and ash.

And as James May headed home to examine pictures of his new Dacia Sandero, the others sat in dejected silence and waited for a tow company to take them back home. Clarkson was just lighting a cigarette when someone honked their horn. It wasn't even at them, but Jack took offence."PISS OFF!" he shouted, and threw a beer bottle at them. The bottle connected with it's target.

Said target was the winner of the Best Ensemble Cast in a Children's show at the BAFTA's. And yellow. And a backhoe loader. And also follow by a cement mixer, a crane, a steamroller, a digger and their two leaders, both of whom were wearing hardhats.

And all of them were ready to defend Scoop to the death.

"Oh for god's sake." said a weary Kelly.

At which point, Clarkson dropped his cigar. Right on the gunpowder covered crew.

Well. There was only one thing to say to that, wasn't there?

"And on that bombshell!" slurred Clarkson, before he passed out and missed the fight completely.

Which is rather the thing you can say about this mini-series as a whole, isn't it? Just when it's getting good and we get to see what we wanted to see, it's all over. THAT'S ALL FOLKS.

NEXT TIME: SEASON 7.

Everything ends. That's a fact. I'm looking forward to doing this, but at the same time I'm not. I am going to miss having that theme song to listen to. To have Mike and Junior's themes in my head. To marvel at the technical wizardry of it all. Still, everything has it's time.

I hope you all have fun with it. I know I shall be.

Elsewhere, Norris Von Stig picked himself up, dusted himself down and went to make a phonecall to his boss.

Operation: Get Rid of the Pack was a success in a slightly different fashion than had been intended. But that was still a success.

Captain Zero would be VERY pleased indeed.