Soo...here we are! The halfway mark! Some things are revealed, a few loose ends are tied up and we move onto the second half now, where storylines start to converge a little bit. I hope you forgive myself in indulging, for just as this last series has a lot of call backs to previous seasons, so too does the Zero story to what I've written before. The characters of Ross and, mentioned, Cromarty are a reference to a little known series called The Adventures of Portland Bill, made by Ivor Wood's company. Just a little reference for fun!

AaronCottrell97: Agreed.

Reality Rejection Service: I guess. XD.

Game-Watch: Magic, perhaps. Or because he's an idiot.

MattPrice01: I really took a lot of time having fun with the episode this time, and I really went all out on the Zero stuff, we're moving into more familiar territory. Hope you enjoy more this time around!

JD145: You never know. :D It could be anyone!

Radical Sandwiches: *THROWS MONEY*.

UGX7: Really?! Wow, I did not know that at all! That certainly makes a lot of sense though, now that you point it out.

CUE THE THEME!

"I say, old things, you're looking pretty wrecked, all things considered!"

Blearily, Edward raised his head from it's downwards position. He regretted it instantly. The whole world seem to swim in and out of focus for a minute. Judging from the groan from besides him, Toby was sustaining a similar ache. "Boxhill!" He slurred as he tried and failed to move forward in a way that indicated dignity. "Didn't realize you were back on the Island."

"Ah. Well, it's bad news I'm afraid, old thing! The Iron Circle's moving me places, won't be able to get into contact so easily for a bit. That being said, I have information that might be of use to you two and old Quackers!"

"...Oh?"

"Hmm. Follow me!"

"That might be more than I can manage at present." groaned Toby.

"Then I shall make Duck follow me TO YOU!"

This achieved, the three engines listened as best as they could as Boxhill gave a quick run-down of the news. Apparently, coming today was a shipment from the Other Railway, delivered by a group of workmen and a few lone diesels who had managed to escape prosecution through some legal loophole or another. This shipment was rumoured to be nothing more than empty crates and boxes.

"Well that's not worth much." growled Toby, who wanted to go back to sleep very much so.

"Ah, but it's not the stuff itself. It's the more, ah, itinerary that's attached to it."

Now that caught Duck's attention. "Really? I suppose you'd need some sort of explanation for why you're lugging around a ton of empty boxes and stuff."

"Yes. And rumor has it from my contact that it might give you a clue as to what it is that we're fighting here. It arrives tonight, not too far from the lighthouse."

"Then I think it's time we planned a heist!" Edward said, sounding more cheerful than he had in weeks. The others looked at each in worry, but they decided to roll with it.

Perhaps if they had bothered to check the weather forecast, they would have rethought this plan. But they hadn't, so they didn't.

...

The engines love working when the sun shines. Especially because the Island of Sodor is apparently the freaky part of the UK where the sun actually does what it's supposed to and warms everything up. People on the Island call it the 'Sodor Effect'. People off the Island call it the 'Reason Why Half The Staff Is Off With Heatstroke Effect'. There's a lot of differences between Islanders and non-islanders.

One day, because they had nothing better to do and because there are exactly two engines who help out regularly at the Docks, Thomas and Percy were assisting Salty there. The old crusty sod was worried. And no, I'm not just talking about Carlin.

"It may be sunny now, mateys! But there be a storm coming! ...In more ways than one, oooh arrr! Isn't that right, Polly?"

"WRAAAAK! STORM!"

As Salty moved off, Thomas looked to Percy. "It may be sunny now, mateys, but there be a storm coming!"

"...That is the worst pirate accent I've ever heard. And the worst Salty impression. In fact I'm pretty sure that that's the worst thing I've ever heard you say. Apart from the fact that you told Henry to his face that you thought trees were icky and stupid and gross."

"I said that?!"

"You were drunk at the time."

"I often am."

"Also, storm's a coming, cap'n! Aye aye and all that." Percy looked bored. I know the feeling.

There came a loud wail of "BOO-HOO-HOO!" from the little station right next to them. Salty had apparently decided that this was a DEADLY insult to him. More deadly than a killer stingray floating atop a jellyfish on a pirate ship that was poured by death. And fired crocodiles. That was how deadly an insult it was.

He would have complained about them to his mum. But she had passed away in bizarre hermit crab related incidents. Or at least, the random old bat who had told him she was his mother.

Engines didn't have mother, he realised in that moment, and therefore was even more miserable about it.

Later, the Fat Man arrived to give him his plot device, I mean job, for the day. "I need you to get the old arsehole out."

"Sir, ye're not me type."

"...Realised when I said it how bad it sounded. No, I mean pick up Fergus from the Smelters. His driver doesn't know the line and he's already hit me several times with his truncheon for daring to suggest that he get a guide. And now they're stuck there and Arry and Bert are giving him crazy eyes. So you're going to be towing Fergus around and listening to his old and pointless stories. You've got that in common at least!"

"MRAK! CUT ME TO THE QUICK! CUT ME TO THE QUICK!"

Emily arrived, pushing a line of trucks and having a hangover that would have killed anyone else.

She was Scottish though, so to her it was just a light breeze. "Hey, Salty! Ye look well! ...That was a wee bit of humor, ye look worse than Gordon. And he's currently drowning in that puddle over there!"

"GLUG GLUG GLUG!"

"So what's the matter? Tell old Auntie Emily, so she can go punt an arsehole's face in!" Despite her words, she sounded interested, unlike most of the Island.

"Nobody likes being made fun of by silly wee tank engines who don't know their arse from their starboard!" Salty said.

"...And if ye could give it ta me in a way that I understand?"

"Thomas and Percy are being bilge-rats!"

"Ah...that is bad right?"

"Aaaaaaaaar, lubber, that it be."

"Right, I can never tell, I always like rats. Maybe explains why I havenae killed James yet."

"Goodbye, lass! TELL ME TALE!"

"I will! ...Once I work out what it is." Unlike Thomas and Percy, she at least waited until Salty was out of the docks to insult him. "Right. Got to go find some tank engines and bust a cap in yon arses!"

...

"Those be dark clouds, matey!"

"There be a fierce storm on thar way, Cap'n!" Percy apparently knew only one pirate saying. Not for the first time, Emily wondered how old these two were. And then she realized she really didn't want to know, because how old engines were compared to humans would be a can of worms she couldn't close back up.

"It's nae nice to copy the way others speak!" She lectured.

"Oh yeah, soccer mom?! I'm pretty sure that Donald and Douglas are thinking of suing the pants off of you!"

"...Ye want to go, Thomas? I'll kick yer arse into yer boiler if ye dinnae go and make up with Salty!"

"Why do you care?!"

"Someone on this Island has ta! And since Edward and Toby are off playing silly spy buggers, then it has to be me!"

"We were just having fun!" said Percy. "Besides, it was Thomas who started it with his terrible acting!"

"YOU ROTTER, I did not! ...Fine we'll go and say sorry!"

As they moved off, Emily nearly fist-punched the air, figuratively speaking. Her first job as incredibly grumpy and hungover 'Designated Sane Person' was going a treat! True, Gordon was now clinically dead and was now being resuscitated by the Breakdown Train, but baby steps were needed.

"Oh dear he isn't here!" Thomas said.

"Well what a pity."

"...Hang on, silly spy buggers?"

...

"We're like a Hanna Barbera group! All we need now is the talking animal side-kick with a speech impediment and we're set!"

Edward had come out of his daze by this point, and was wondering to himself why he had thought a caper like this was a good idea. At this point, both Duck and Toby seemed to be having fun, so he felt churlish to tell them to knock it off.

The diesel had left the flatbed, and the itinerary, unattended.

"Now, all we have to is-"

'Never Gonna Give You Up' suddenly started blaring from Duck's cab. Unaware that he had accidentally invented a long-running meme, Duck winced and had his driver bring the phone so he could answer it.

Don't question how he could.

"Hello? Oliver, NOT NOW! No I know that you have achy-wheels, but it's not my problem! ...No, we're only trying to SAVE THE WORLD HERE YOU...I'm not shouting. No, YOU'RE BEING UN-GREAT WESTERN!" He hung up. "You know, I'm getting a new phone anyway, who needs this?"

He had his driver throw it backwards.

There was a loud crash. And then the world got a little darker.

"You just hit the lighthouse's fuse-box, didn't you?" Duck remarked, quietly. His driver nodded in shame.

"...RUN!"

And off they scarpered, Edward remembering to leave money for the lighthouse keeper and steal the train.

...

"This don't look much like the smelters!" muttered Salty, who saw Fergus and immediately grimaced.

"Right on time! For one of your kind, you're really quite the mover!"

"...I'm going to let that slide."

"All right, sunshine! So you're my new partner! I've heard you're a cowboy, who plays by his own rules!"

"Aaaar, ye be watching the wrong channel, matey!"

"It's SARGE to you!" Fergus was enjoying this quite a bit. He decided to smack Salty on the nonce with his truncheon. Polly took umbrage to that and slapped Fergus back. Stunned, he had no way of stopping Salty from dragging him off around the Island on a whistle-stop tour.

...

It was a fierce storm, like Salty had said. The ships that depended on the lighthouse were in dire need of assistance from the coast. Unfortunately, someone had broken the fuse-box.

Elsewhere, Duck was being given merry hell by the other engines as they dug through the contents of their steal.

"THE LIGHTHOUSE LAMP HAS GONE OUT!" wailed the Captain.

"Oh, NO SHIT!" said his crew.

Salty and Fergus fought their way through the wind and rain, and Salty through Fergus's demands that they engage in a high-speed pursuit. Apparently in the seventies there were a large amount of random cardboard boxes that were left on pavements just so the traction engine could run them over. Thankfully, Fergus was saved by the arrival of a man with a lantern.

Ross, the light-house keeper, was stressed. "I need someone to act as a generator!" He said in a very high-pitched voice, his balls had yet to drop. "And Cromarty's gone off to get his tea!"

"The hell's a Cromarty?!" muttered Fergus. Salty shrugged, he had no idea, but it was best to play along with the weeping lighthouse keeper. Then he had an idea.

"Fergus has a flywheel! Ye can use that to power the generator, if ye want!" He grinned at Fergus. "Not a bad idea for one of my kind, eh?"

"I'LL TELL THE GUV ON YOU!" snarled Fergus, enraged at this gross misuse of his body.

"HURRY!" said Ross, who had just wanted to rant to the engines, and hadn't expected an actual answer. Soon the flywheel was attached and Fergus was busy working the generator's shaft (NOT LIKE THAT, YOU...DIRTY MINDED PEOPLE). The ship, which might as well have been pushed along by hand, was still bobbing out in the water. Why they didn't just head off towards the docks is anyone's guess.

Just in time, the light kicked back on.

"THE LIGHT'S BACK!" screamed the Captain.

"OH, NO SHIT!" screamed the crew.

"That went well!" said Salty. "Arrrr, how ye be doing?"

"I hate my life!" moaned Fergus. "Can't I just go beat up a perp?"

...

The next day, the two of them chugged back to the docks. For whatever reason, instead of dropping Fergus off where he was needed, or even back at the Smelters. They were surprised to see a large crowd of cheering followers. Unfortunately, they had been expecting someone else, and thus had to make do with a smelly old diesel and a steam traction engine stuck in The Sweeney.

"THERE'S THE DIESEL WHO SAVED ME SHIP!" said the Captain.

"Oh, no shit." said the Fat Controller, who was aware of the Rule of Three. "Wellllllllll done Salty and the other one." Fergus sighed, deeply depressed, while Salty beamed with pride. The two little sods rolled up alongside him with Emily's prepared apology speech.

"Sorry if we hurt your feelings." muttered Thomas.

"We were only copying you because we think...oh dear god, who wrote this shit? We think you're grand!"

"Then say no more me hearteys! Ye owe me ten bottles of the finest grog!"

And now they will all work together and have fun together as good friends should-Okay, who the hell slipped that last line in? That's really, really not a good line to end the episode on!

What? We are!?

I'm so tired. And it's only episode thirteen!? HOW?!

...

"All right, let's see what we've got here." Duck peered down at the inventory. It was messy handwriting, but he had seen worse. As he read, his eyes widened. "Huh."

"What is it?"

"Absolutely nothing if you don't know how to read between the lies. Luckily I had a master teaching me how to." He blinked once or twice. "The boxes themselves are nothing special. What is interesting is their specific measurements. The first two there-" He nodded in the direction of the flatbed "-are sized just enough for a certain pair of Caledonian twins I know."

"Wait-"

"The smaller boxes back that way are about right for the Narrow Gauge engines. And there are several boxes that seem to indicate that whatever remaining intelligent rolling stock we have is to be removed post haste."

"...Shit, that's what the Railway Board has been up to!" cried Toby. "They're removing us one by one!"

"No, not us." Edward looked up in concentration. "Think about it, there's nothing here for any of the Tidmouth Seven. You'd think if they were getting rid of any competition we'd be the first to go. But they're not."

"...No, because you're too high profile!" Duck said, realising something. "I don't know about you, but my fan-letters don't even come close to the amount you get every day. You're celebrities thanks to the documentary, removing you would be far too public and far too attention drawing. But Donald and Douglas disappeared for a full season back in 1998, I've been decreasing in appearances since the fourth one, Oliver was barely in the last one in any meaningful way, and the Skarloey engines are practically one or two episode wonders now. We're not necessary."

"...Then we need to act. To warn everyone."

Duck nodded. "I'll contact Boxhill. This itinerary and the notes I'll make should be enough to make sure that the feuding sides grow the hell up!"

In retrospect, perhaps leaving the information out in the open was asking for trouble.

But that's a story for next time.

...

THE PAST.

The second that Zero entered the mill he regretted his choice. He should have at least asked for assistance from Boomer, asshole that he thought the biker was, he was at least strong enough to take two men on.

The mill's gears were turning and clanking together that there was no doubt in his mind what would happen with one short, sharp shove. He wondered vaguely if his Mysteron transformation covered having his brain crushed into a million tiny wet pieces. He decided not to think on it, and as he moved forward, he drew forth his revolver.

He ascended to the stairs, his eyes peering this way and that, every shadow seeming to invite a potential threat.

He was on the top stair when Grout rammed into him with the full force of a rugby player. Zero screeched in panic, firing off a single shot that seemed to ricochet around the room. He stumbled backwards, his leg catching between the wooden slat and breaking his fall in the most painful way possible. He twisted around to see Grout, bleeding from the head, staggering to his feet and rushing towards him.

He fired. The first bullet hit but Grout was like a freight train now. He ploughed into the Captain with full force.

His mistake.

The wood was rotten. Windy Miller, a distant relation of Dusty Miller, had intended to fix that at some point. The weight wouldn't have done anything had it not been for the way that Grout seemed to leap onto the step in an attempt to make the final blow all the more final.

Zero screamed in shock as he swung himself upwards, his leg freed from it's painful trap. He grabbed hold of the door-frame, almost on auto-pilot. All of this in one second.

Grout hadn't been able to stop himself. The sudden loss of the ground under him had sent him plummeting towards the ground, or in this case, the very large and painful looking machinery that seemed to open like a jaw for him. He fell, feet first, into it.

It took him longer than Zero was comfortable with to die. Luckily his screams were cut off by the mill throwing a fit at the large new ingredient for the bread that it had to make.

"Well-" said Zero, trying to force himself back up onto his feet "-talk about gaining some ground there."

He was just congratulating himself on the stellar pun, and trying to avoid the agony of his leg rearranging itself, when he saw Snort step forward. His gun was significantly larger, and it wasn't currently being crunched up by heavy machinery. Snort looked, it must be said, deranged.

"I never trusted you!" he hissed. "You and your...stupidity have set us back so long! You wiped out my home!"

"How funny." Zero was aware that he really shouldn't taunt the mad man holding what appeared to be a rifle and pointing it at his chest, but he'd just watched a man be force-fed into a grinder and did nothing to help, he was a little far gone by this point. "When twas me destroying MY home, ye had nae problem with it!" The gun was too far away.

"Yes. It was necessary. For the greater good, she was there! The lost engine was there, we had to wipe her out before she wipes us out for the greater good!"

Zero laughed. "Snorty, lad, dinnae ye know? The Greater Good is what people who can't face up ta the fact that they've din horrible things say to make sure they sleep well at night. Take me for instance, I know that I'm shite. I'm honest about it. I don't care about ye and yer precious little town-"

The bullet hit his shoulder. Oh shit it hurt! They hadn't hurt as much before.

"I'd be quiet if I were you." Snort advanced forward. "I am going to enjoy this a lot."

His finger was on the trigger.

And then suddenly, the world flickered for a moment like static on a television.

The Clown stood behind Snort. Smiling.

And then he opened his mouth.

Zero was staring right at the both of them. He didn't blink or look away, it happened so quickly (Or so he remembered. He thought) that he couldn't. And yet for the life of him afterwards, even to the day he told the story to John, he could not recall just what The Clown had done.

What he did remember was that three seconds after The Clown's jaw had opened far wider than any human jaw had any right to open, Snort screamed. He screamed and screamed and screamed and screamed until he reached the lung capacity of an average human, and then he continued to scream for ten long seconds before suddenly, and with no warning, he stopped.

Snort was gone.

The Clown stepped forward, and bent down to look Zero in the eye. Zero stared back, and it would have almost been a comfort to see something so terrible and so complex in it's wonderful horror.

He saw nothing. Absolutely nothing in the Clown's eye.

And then The Clown spoke. In a language that no one has ever been able to decipher, yet somehow Zero got the gist of it. The message really was simple when you got down to it.

Find the Malignance. He is the answer. As he has always been the answer.

He will save us.

And then the Clown was gone.

...

And the rest, really, can be summed up far more succinctly.

One day after the Battle of Camberwick Green, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy got into a car and was driven down the streets of Dallas. I'm sure you don't need me to tell you what happened next. Suffice to say, in the chaos of dealing with the idea that someone had killed such a high figure in the world, the British Government paid no heed to the rumours of something that had happened in Trumptonshire. It was too late by then too.

The people returned, to a clean and healthy looking area. They had worked very fast in getting things in tip-top condition. The Accountant quietly took control of things while the infection took route. He was helped by this by a gift that Captain Zero was soon to learn came from his Mysteron chums. Belborough, Snort, Grout and the rest of the Pippin Fort men had been...duplicated. This in a less than perfect way, but this was workable, as the Accountant and the Captain could sell their unique appearance as being the price to pay to be freed from the illness that had ravaged the town.

Over the course of the next three years, cameras were set up by someone, one of the tech boys probably, that recorded the dying days of the county. Removing all sound from them, it soon became impossible to tell that the people were beginning to panic. Once sufficient enough footage was taken, the entire county was sent off in the Juggernaut to his other master, City of Truro, as proof that the Other Railway was done being the plaything of well meaning, if ruthless, would-be philanthropists.

The footage itself was later redubbed by a man name Brian Cant, and under the direction of Gordon Murray, televised to the world as three stories of life in a rural village. No one was ever quite sure why the hell the intro showed a clown winding up a music box, but Zero suspected that it was a message of some sort. Remember what you have to do.

The poor souls of the county were soon removed, and rumours that they had been locked inside the music box that the Clown had last been seen carrying before his disappearance for quite some time were never substantiated. But Zero knew.

In the aftermath of this, the Accountant decided that this title no longer suited him. Someone had once mockingly called him a 'Fat Director'. He decided that this would be a fine moniker to own. After all, the Fat Director of the early lines had been the man in charge of all the railways. And that was what he wanted to be.

And from there, Captain Zero watched as the sleepy area of Trumptonshire vanished. If the Beeching Cuts had been meant to stop the branch-lines, then this was undoing a lot of that attempted progress. Stretching down from that area to Barrow, the Other Railway grew and grew and grew, grass and trees felled whenever they got in their way, water was saved only to service hydro-electric dams that had been created by Doctor Gurtzer, and one by one every major line had at least some area where they had to go through the unmarked territory. Soon, areas that had been unclaimed for years were bought and wiped out for the Other Railway to expand like a massive, unstoppable tumour that grew and grew and grew.

...

"Are we at the end yet?"

"Hardly, John. Hardly. Let's skip ahead now."

...

The nineteen seventies.

By this point, the Packards were growing restless. Jenny Packard was away at school, becoming quite the ruffian on the hockey field as it turned out. But Mrs Zero glared at the Captain on the few occasions he dared venture home. Besides which, this identity was beginning to bore him significantly. Construction was now consuming his every waking moment, and as he had begun to train a secondary group of workers who had came to the Other Railway to practice their skills in expanding the OR's borders if necessary, he decided that one last job was in order.

The idea for what that was came from the Fat Director himself. According to notes he had pertaining to the nature of the Malevolence, there was something that he called a 'portal device' that was located somewhere in Trumpton. That was the one area of the county that still remained somewhat active, and had not yet been totally torn apart. It had been claimed by someone else before they could tear it completely to shreds. But even as such, the Other Railway loomed over the area with a general idea that soon, very soon, it would be theirs.

The portal device, he would later learn, was responsible for the transportation of many OR troops and diesels over into the Island during the Battle of Sodor. It's other purpose is best saved for another day. Suffice to say, he needed the best. The bravest.

He needed a Pack.

And there they stood. Kelly, raring to go and full of life. Isabella, determined to get stuck into the muck. Alfie, a calm, measured digger. Patrick, who was beginning to wonder if life could be any better. Ned, quietly content. Oliver, sober as ever. Max and Monty, always willing to obey orders. Nelson, humble as he always was. Byron, the nature lover. Buster...who had yet to discover rap music.

And of course, the true leader of the Pack, the one who did his best no matter what, and was always, always ready to help out.

Nigel.

What happened next would define many lives for a long time to come.