Surprises both good and bad.
Canterlot, capital city and center of Equestria showing the unity between Earth, Unicorn and Pegasus races. The crisp cold air rolls across the heated boiler of the friendship express, two short whistle blast and the train is off heading for Manhatten. As the engine struggles with its ten coach train two earth ponies, both of which had soot gray fur with brown manes and tails. That was all the two had in common from the average eye since both were different sizes, physical condition and even the style of their manes and tails. As the two watched from the engine shed the smaller one started shaking his head.
"It's a damn shame." Said the short rotund one. "Five years ago that was the pride of the railroads and now that tiny engine is making us the laughing stock of the Northern region."
"Careful Valve, you keep going on like this again and we'll have to take ya back to the hospital. And I doubt mom or dad would want to pay the bills this time." Spoken from the more physically fit of the two.
The smaller stallion huffed, annoyed by the comment but yet he looked up in the sky wondering how life was going for their parents, he was about to say something when a familiar red pegasus, she stood in stark contrast to the two stallions with her fur and yellow mane. "Hey Ballast, we got our orders for a small train to take to Canterlot Junction and back."
The larger stallion stood up and stretched, nodding and going to grab a few tools for the job as the mare turned her attention to Valve Gear. "Oh, and you've been asked over to the yard office. Something about a promotion."
Valve Gear looks up at her confused. "What, a promotion? Why, we've only been here for a few years."
The mare shrugs and walks off. "No clue, but I gotta get my engine so you have fun now."
With that Valve Gear stood up and started making his way across the yard, sadly over the short life of the railroad very little has happened since most of the farmers in Northern Equestria out right refuse to have these "smoke belching monsters" take away the food they grow. Soon enough he reached the yard office and walked in where he was directed to the second floor.
Upon walking in he was shocked to find the CERR's Chief Mechanical Engineer Span Bolster, a massive Clydesdale mare. Valve Gear being shocked that he was asked to meet her for being a mechanic locked up before standing tall and trying to be formal. "Muh-Miss Span Bolster! If I knew you asked for I would have-" He was cut off as Span stood up.
"At ease already, I'll cut to the case and say that my last assistant was fired and I need a replacement. You've been giving your all on the shop floors from what I've been told so you've been promoted, congratulations." She said in a very plain tone.
Before Valve could respond Span spoke up again. "Now I got a job for you, do well and you can keep your job. A while ago we ordered some new motive power to test out on the railroad and you're to go with the crew to pick up the locomotives in an hour from Las Pegasus port #4. Normally I'd go myself but I'm being dragged north to oversee a line extension. Oh, and we ordered four different engines from the Minotaur Kingdom, list is right here. We'll talk about your work more when I get back." And just like that she pushed Valve out of her office while giving him the list, locked up and left leaving the confused, if slightly giddy, stallion alone with the orders and crew he'd be working with.
"Uhm... Right that's great news thank you Miss Span Bolster..." Then her orders finally hit him like a brick and he became estatic and happily trotted off to speak with the crew.
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An hour later, Valve was on his way to the train to take him to Las Pegasus. When he got there he was shocked when Full Throttle shouted out. "Hey Valve! We just got the good news so congrats!"
Valve smiled as he climbed aboard the caboose where he, along with Throttle, Ballast and Smokebox the four had a short celebration before Throttle and Smokebox had to return to the engine to head out. When they left Valve turned to his brother. "I thought you three went out to Canterlot Junction, how'd you get back so fast?"
Ballast spoke up as he waved his arm outside the window giving the signal to move out. "You know the junction is only five or six miles out, we got lucky when the southbound freight got helper service from another crew." He then climbed into the cupola to keep an eye out for hotboxes.
Valve nodded, remembering how the NER's "heavy freight engine" struggles to pull 300 ton trains over the steep grades and admit-ably rough track work of the CERR. That's when it dawns on him why they ordered the new engines, the management must be desperate for new power and want to test out what the NER won't make since they wouldn't need it.
After an hour of travel they reach the docks and have their engine disconnected while one of the NER's dock tanks pushes the caboose and boxcar to pier four where the engines wait. Valve and Ballast get out and walk over to the engines, the younger brother takes out the list and starts double checks them.
"Let's see, one 4-4-0, check. One 2-6-0, check. One 0-6-0, check. And one 2-8-0..." He has to stop as the biggest engine they ordered was replaced with a 2-4-0 Porter. "Ballast stay here, I think the dock manager made a mistake." His brother nods as Valve walks to the dock office, it doesn't take long until he can meet with the very old goat.
"Hello, I'm Valve Gear sent to-" He gets interrupted as the goat talks.
"Oh ya horses is here, perfect. We got a ship that needs tah unload and yer ingenes is in the way."
"As I was saying." Valve said. "We're here to pick up our locomotives but one of them is missing and we got that tiny porter instead."
The goat looked confused and rubbed his horn before speaking up. "Ya didn't hear, another war broke out in the homeland and the Minotaurs took that big ingene. Ya gotta be lucky to get most of ya order and a free wee ingene."
Valve face hooved and groaned. "But it's not free cause we payed for the bigger one! Isn't there anything you can do?"
The goat sighed. "Nope, ya gonna have to talk to the company that made em. Might as well take em ingenes now though, we oiled em up for ya's."
Valve rubbed his face in disbelief before turning around. "Well, thanks for that. We'll get them outta your horns now." With that the stallion left and returned to the crew whom were getting the engines ready for travel back to Canterlot.
"Hey Valve what's the deal? Is that other engine somewhere else?" Ballast said.
Valve shook his head. "Yeah but we're not getting it, let's head back..."
Author's Note
So that's the first chapter, I hope everything is going well and people enjoy it. And cause I know at least one person will ask what the engines were/looked like I'll post them here. Plus this will help visualize the engines for future use.
The 4-4-0.
The 2-6-0.
The 0-6-0.
And that pesky 2-4-0.
Working with what you got
The train that Valve and his fellows were making good time, with the hard barking of an Ex NER small goods engine they soon reached the transfer yard at Ponyville. From this point Canterlot is a hop skip and a jump away, but with the added challenge of a ruling grade of 2.6% for nearly three miles requiring the need for a helper engine for trains nearing 300 tons in weight. As the train pulled into the yards Ballast hopped out of the caboose and made his way over to the yard house to request help over the grade, but not without getting interrupted by Full Throttle.
"Say Ballast, can't help but notice your bro being quite when we left. He can't really be upset over one engine right?" She said with a mixture of concern and some teasing.
"Well it's not that he's upset, more of a "Oh dear Celestia did I screw up my first job" kinda thing. The stallion replied. "He's had this problem since we were colts but... Look it's nothing, I gotta see about getting help up to Canterlot, I'll be back in a sec." Ballast said off handily while walking off.
With that Throttle turned back and returned to the engine, on her way back she saw Valve regressing the joints of the engines, which relieved her a little seeing as how he can still do work. Part of her really wanted to go over and check to make sure but could she really help him? Ballast said said that this happened in the past... Maybe letting him be on his own is for the best, if it gets worse then she'll talk to him.
Valve was only greasing the joints to distract him from two thoughts that had been plaguing him for the whole trip, on one hoof he was given the wrong list and the 2-8-0 was swapped out for the 2-4-0, which case he won't have anything to worry about. Or he took the smaller engine for no reason and with no proper heavy freight engine the railroad will lose more money and he'll be sacked. Between the two options he knew which one he preferred but reality has a funny way of having situations go south more often than not.
With the engines ready for the last leg of the trip he saw Ballast walking back out of the yard office and he waved to his brother. "Hey Ballast, any luck with that helper?"
"For once these snobs are gonna give us a hand but it's gonna be an old express engine that'll get sent to the scrapyard when we get there." Ballast says while turning his attention to a very old looking 2-2-2 engine with a name plate saying "Prince Blueblood" over the 8'6' diameter wheel.
Valve's mouth dropped open in disbelief as all previous thoughts were replaced with the singular thought about how much he hated the NER. "Are they bucking serious!? Those things could never climb hills, everypony knows that! Ignoring the fact that is older then Celestia it was built for speed only! And even then they were out classed by the King Grovers a few months later!"
"I know Valve!" Ballast shouted back almost giving him a wake up punch to the arm before stopping himself. "Look, I know it's bad, I know they're only helping us to take out their trash and I know you hate the NER. But we gotta take four engines up that hill and we need all the help we can get." Ballast noticed the Blueblood moving into position and went over to help get it connected leaving Valve to go let Smokebox and Throttle know.
Upon reaching the engine Valve started explaining the situation, while trying not to blow his top. "Well at least we got some help, I should go back and make sure they know our whistle codes." Throttle said as she steped out of the cab and headed back. Valve was about to do the same when Smokebox finally spoke up.
"I give it about a two miles before that thing breaks down, then it'll be extra weight for us to carry." Valve knew he was right, an old engine like the Blueblood just isn't cut out for this kind of work.
"Say Valve, I think it'd be best if you stayed up front now. If that weasel pops then we're gonna be working our flanks off and I could use help keeping pressure up."
It wouldn't take much convincing from the soot black stallion for Valve to stay in the cab, it did help that Valve enjoyed riding in the cabs more then the caboose. Meanwhile at the rear of the train. "Right just to make sure we're clear. We'll only go at low speed so just remember that two short blast means forwards, one short means stop and apply brakes and constant whistling means emergency."
The engineer of Blueblood nods. "Don't worry miss, we'll do what we can to get you kiddo's over the hill." He chuckles to himself leaning out of the cab.
Throttle can only roll her eyes as she heads back to the front, passing ballast who gave the all clear and let her know that Valve was going to ride in the cab this time. No real problem there since Valve knows how to help around the cab.
Once she reached the locomotive she leaned out the cab waiting for Ballast' signal to head out, with a wave of his hand she gave two short whistle blast and the train was under way. From the front came the loud chuffing associated with freight locomotives as black smoke was shot high into the air. And at the rear the Blueblood gave her all to push, she wasn't as loud as the small 0-6-0 engine ahead but the crew did want to give the engine everything she had for this last run. And so far things were going well, the cavalcade of new and old engines, while only going 10-12mph, was still an impressive sight for any onlookers seeing two old engines move four new locos up the steep incline.
During the climb Valve leaned out the cab and saw the first mile post come into view. "We're already a third the way done, we might've been wrong about that dinosaur pushing us!" Valve shouted over the barking of the 0-6-0 when a deafening bang was heard from behind them followed by rapid whistle blast, each one getting quieter and quieter. Throttle slammed on the brakes as Valve jumped out of the cab and ran back to see the damage from the Blueblood. He was shocked when he saw what happened, Blueblood's right cylinder had exploded with steam escaping rapidly, Valve ran to see if the crew was alright and thankfully nothing had happened to them. "What the name of tartarus happened!?" He shouted.
The firepony set the brakes and jumped out the cab next to Valve as the engineer tried to shut the regulator. "No clue, we looked her over before we headed out! The piston must have been more worn then we thought!" He exclaimed as the Blueblood finally ran out of steam and slumped backwards now resting on her brakes.
By this point the sun was setting and darkness started to take over, the crew of Blueblood, Valve and Ballast all talked through the options available. As it got darker the only choices were to either head back to Poniville and wait over night for another one or two helper engines, which wouldn't be the wisest option since having the power of two engines to control the train downhill. Or they could try climbing the rest of the hill, which could be done without Blueblood albeit with more work, fuel consumption and significantly reduced speed.
"We might as well keep going forwards, the Blueblood was only needed for extra help. If we go back we can't get new help and would have to restart the whole thing." Valve explained to the other three. "We have to get these engines delivered by tomorrow morning and we can't guarantee anymore "help" from the NER." The other three agreed and set to work picking up the pieces of the blown up cylinder and undid Blueblood's brakes while Valve made his way up to deliver the bad news.
"Great, that's 500 plus tons of wood and metal we gotta move up two miles of 2.6% grade with an engine that struggles on 300 ton trains." Throttle said crossing her hooves, she was cross but kept her eye out back for when the three back there are on board and ready to head out.
Smokebox grunted as he picked up a shovel. "Humph, good thing I don't gamble, that thing only went half as far as I guessed. Valve, you mind watching the water gauges, I'll handle the coal." Valve nodded his head, the air was thick with tension as they waited for the signal, none of them wanted to do this but they had to, all three were determined to get this train to Canterlot. Then the Ballast gave the signal to move forward, two short blast of the whistle and they were off, backwards as the little 0-6-0 tried to get it's grip. With a lot of grunt and some sand they were finally off going forwards, the small engine barking up a storm of smoke and sparks as she dragged the train up and a crawling pace, 1...2...3...4mph was all she could manage which was fine since Ballast could run up to the cab to give them some good news.
"Luckily we were the last train scheduled to come up today, looks like they were gonna have the Blueblood run light behind us." Ballast said giving the crew some breathing room.
"Good, did they drop the fire before we got moving?" Smokebox asked to which Ballast smiled and nodded. With that bit of good news given Ballast returned to the caboose leaving the three to keep boiler pressure high, water in the boiler and the fire burning hot. Even then the engine struggled hard to keep going as the heavy train pulled against her.
Soon enough the second mile post came into view and things were going alright. "Good news, we should be there soon enough, how're we doing on fuel?" Throttle turned back and asked.
Smokebox went back to check the water, but when he returned he had bad news. "Not good, at this rate we'll run dry before reaching Canterlot, we could try taking Blueblood's remaining water."
"That'll mean stopping again, but we don't have a choice." Throttle applied the brakes again and the train stopped, Smokebox climbed out and went back to the caboose and banged on the door.
"Grab the buckets and help us out, we need water from the scrap heap!" With that the four grabbed as many buckets, using a drainage pipe the the four started bringing buckets of water forward, with the help of Valve as well it took another 35 minutes to move all the water out of Blueblood. With that they couldn't wait any longer and got back to work grunting the train up the hill.
It took a while but the train reached 3mph, nopony dared to push harder as darkness surrounded them, between the chuffs of the little engine Valve could hear the groaning metal of the cold locomotives behind them. Eventually they noticed the speed increase, the three ponies were working so hard they didn't notice the grade flatten, looking forwards then to the back of the train they noticed that they passed the third and final mile post.
"YES! We did it, we beat the hill!" The three shouted and cheered, against the odds and the helper losing it's piston before the halfway point they were able to pull five engines, a boxcar and a caboose over the hill and into Canterlot. Soon enough they reached the rail yard and were directed onto a siding near the engine repair shop. Some yard hands came out to refuel the small freight engine and disconnect Blueblood from the train which was eventually taken away.
The two stallions that came with up the hill left them to go rest for a return train to Ponyville early in the morning. Throttle and Smokebox also left to go home, mostly cause they've been up for 18 hours. Leaving Valve and Ballast alone in the yard. "So Valve, now that we're back do you think the 2-4-0 will be a problem?"
Valve sighed as the cold air rolled in. "Probably, these engines are much bigger then anything the NER has. Which is fine since these things will be better then what we got, but why go to the Minotaurs for engines and not the NER?"
Ballast shook his head as he looked onto the engines. "Who knows what management is thinking. Might have something to do with the our Northern neighbors. Anyways it's late, we gotta get up early tomorrow." Ballast walked off with Valve following a few minutes later.
Author's Note
So here's hoping that this chapter is an improvement over the first one, as always criticism is happily appreciated.
Oh and for those of you who want to see what the engines in this chapter.
The 0-6-0.
And that 2-2-2 that played Prince Blueblood.
