Loading and unloading of cargo has always been a complex and tricky business. Today was no different, and the workmen on the docks were moving boxes back and forth loaded with fish from the early morning catch.

Porter sat on the dockside, coupled to several fish vans that were to be loaded. Normally, he would run up the dockside with his vacuum pipes disconnected, but today things were slightly different.

"What's this smelly thing at the other end?" he asked.

"That?" Izzy asked rhetorically. "It's something Neville brought with him. It's an old horsebox that's been fitted with a steam heating boiler that will power the fish trucks and their onboard temperature control systems."

"Talk about fancy," Porter replied. "Back when I started in the yard they were still loading trucks with ice. That turned them into a timer- once the ice was loaded you had to get a move on, as there was no guarantee wou'd be able to top up on route."

There were a series of door slams, and then a voice called. "Careful! One box to go!"

The last box was being moved by Rocky, which had been pulled out of storage to help out. Normally he wasn't seen this fare up the quay, but his arm was very helpful. "Not long now!" he said.

But as his arm passed over Porter, it happened. The bottom of the box gave way, and fish tumbled all over Porter!

"Sorry!" Rocky said.

Izzy laughed. "No big deal. Besides, he's the Flying Kipper now! Smell that smell!"

"I don't like fish."

Later on, after the vans had been delivered, Porter was taking a selection of parts up to Penrhyn. The yard crane had broken down, and they needed to fix it, and so they were on their way when suddenly Porter spotted something.

"Red flags at the lineside," he said. "That usually doesn't look good."

Just then, a loud bang echoed underneath him. "Oof! That made my axles tingle!"

Izzy looked about. "Detonators," she said. "We'd best stop."

Once they had stopped, a workman walked over. "Sorry about the noise," he said. "We've got some issues with the embankment. Until then trains are being required to work at slower speeds."

"Charles won't like that," Porter said.

"Who cares what he thinks?" Izzy asked. "Right away!"

The workmen climbed aboard and rode with them to the other end of the section. At the other end, they placed a special lamp. This would warn trains coming the other way, and the workmen connected it to a gas bottle for when night fell.

Later that day, Porter had just dropped back to the shed when he saw Pipp walk over to Sophie. "I hadn't seen you all day," he said. "I was wondering where you'd been!"

"Late night oil delivery," Pipp explained. "The railway prefers to move oil at night to avoid disrupting passenger traffic. But this will make a mess of my sleep schedule."

"Go to bed early?" Izzy suggested.

"That's what I tell my followers to do," Pipp replied, as she got Sophie's engine fired up.

"Be careful out there!" Izzy said. "There's a speed restriction around Penrhyn due to an embankment!"

"Thanks for the warning!" Sophie said, as she powered into the darkness.

Work had gone long at the University, and Argyle was only now beginning to make his way home. It still stunned him just how quickly it fell dark around this time of year. What was only half five felt like the dead of night, and Argyle was keen to stick to the brightly lit streets as he walked home. Truth be told, walking home in the dark always unnerved him, primarily because of the threat of danger. Goldie always tried to stick to well lit areas or be home before the sun set, and Argyle always told Sunny to try and be back home before sundown if possible.

As he rounded a bend, he suddenly heard strange noises from the boardwalk area. Somebody was on the Pleasure Beach! "That's funny, I thought it was shut today."

He dipped back into an alleyway as he suddenly heard some noises coming up the tramway. He looked out, and saw a large green engine puffing down the rails, his eyes looking back and forth quite quickly.

Then the engine spotted him. "You'll stop hiding if you know what's good for you," he said.

Argyle looked about- and suddenly found himself face to face with a woman with purple skin and some white streaks. This was combined with yellow eyes and a set of white, course gloves. She wore a green shirt, a turquoise coat, and purple heavy duty pants combined with a pair of grey boots.

"Wh- where did you come from?" he stammered.

"Far, far from here," the woman said. "And if you're at all sensible you won't get in my way."

Argyle backed up. "Wh- what do you want with me? Is it money?"

The engine behind him laughed. "Allura has no need of your money, foolish human."

"Indeed, Alfred," Allura said. "As for you, Albert- well, you probably don't know me. But I know the Starshines very well. Everywhere I go your lot seem to keep getting in my way. Misty Island, the mine, now here. No matter where I go, I get driven away."

Argyle then made the connection, his mind missing the fact this woman somehow knew his real name. "Were you the one who made the ice boulder?"

"The very same," Allura said. "But nobody came to any harm. Besides, I'm not the villain here. Listen, and I shall explain."

She walked back to Alfred, and music began in the background.

Pipp attached Sophie to the oil tankers, and then hopped back in the cab. "It's nice to be in a fully heated environment," she said. "The weather sure is frightful out there."

"Keep an eye out for the red light!" Sophie said. "The foreman warned us a red light would make clear where the damaged land is!"

"I know just what to look for," Pipp smiled, and advanced the throttle. The fog was beginning to settle across the track, reducing visibility to about zero. In the lack of visibility, seeing anything was just about impossible. The track continued to rumble underneath them, and before long they saw the red light in the gloom.

"Here we are- reducing speed to twenty miles per hour," Pipp said. The tanker train rolled slowly through the section, with the track creaking as they ran over it.

"That didn't sound right," Sophie said. And she was right. Little did either of them know, but the weight of the tankers had damaged the track even further. All it needed was one more hit and things would fall apart.

Allura looked back to Argyle- and started to sing.

"You say I'm a monster!
You say I'm a bully!
If that's how you paint me/
Well... you never knew me!

"Spent my life on the outside looking in/
Can't remember what it feels like! (feels like)
Now I must begin all over again/
Another place that never fit right!

"I would've done it all so differently! (had I known)
Say I'm a bully, you can make believe! (if you want it)
Now everybody thinks the worst of me! (worst of me)
Oh, well.

Just then, Alfred joined in.

"They won't stop 'til they make a monster out of me/ (Ha, ha)
They got their minds made up, but they just can't see! (Ha, ha)
'Cause all I really wanna do is find my way back to you/
Always find my way right back to you!

(Always find my way right back to you) (Ha, ha)
"Find my way right back to you! (Ha, ha)
(Always find my way right back to you) (Ha, ha)
You-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh (Ha, ha)

Argyle spoke up. "Hold on a minute. Could you just clarify something?"

"If I feel like it," Allura said.

"Who are you referring to when you say 'you'?"

Allura beckoned for him to walk closer. "I speak of somebody very close to me. You probably wouldn't know this, but I am not from around here. Neither myself nor Alfred belong in this world. As you can probably guess from my accent I am originally from Norfolk, where I grew up with my brother, Alterro. We did virtually everything together, and that even extended to helping at a local heritage line, the North Norfolk.

"The line was home to, amongst other things, a pair of B12 locomotives; Alfred was one of them. The other was called Hazel, and she and Alfred had fled there from Norwich shed when much of the class was withdrawn. We worked together and the pair were popular at special event days- there aren't many places where two engines of the same class run together in this country."

Argyle looked confused. "Norfolk is to the north of here."

"You're not listening," Alfred said. "We're not from your Norfolk. Our Norfolk is from the other side of the dimensional curtain. We don't belong here- we cannot stop, we cannot rest, we cannot linger anywhere. All because of our own foolish actions."

"What happened?"

Allura took up the story. "It happened at a place called Holt. The station sat on the sight of an old goods yard, and was being rebuilt in readiness for opening as part of the heritage railway. Myself and Alfred were shunting building supplies when we spotted a strange glow from one set of buffers. Alterro warned us not to go near it, but in my foolishness I didn't listen. There was a bright flash, and suddenly none of our friends were there. Not only that, I was stuck in a world where I didn't exist.

"All these years, I have tried to find a way home- but idiots keep getting in the way!"

Suddenly, Alfred took up the song.

"All my life been bouncing place to place/
Never welcomed, always chased away! (chased away)
Always made to wander near the edge/
In the distance I'm afraid!

"I would've done it all so differently! (had I known)
Say I'm a bully, you can make believe! (if you want it)
Now everybody thinks the worst of me! (worst of me)
We're used to it."

Allura then joined in again.

"They won't stop 'til they make a monster out of me! (Ha, ha)
They got their minds made up, but they just can't see! (Ha, ha)
'Cause all I really wanna do is find my way back to you/
Always find my way right back to you!

(Always find my way right back) (Ha, ha)
"Find my way right back to you! (Ha, ha)
(Always find my way right back) (Ha, ha)
You-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh (Ha, ha)

"You say I'm a monster!
You say I'm a bully!
If that's how you paint me/
Well... you never knew me!"

Argyle looked at her. "Allura, we can help you," he said. "I'm an expert in this sort of thing, and it sounds as though you got teleported between dimensions by the Magic Railway. I can do some research and see if a tunnel leads back to Holt or-"

"With the way you people have treated me, how can I trust you?" Allura interrupted. "You disrupted my operations on Misty Island. You stole the Nova Charm- my last shot at getting home. And now mining gets in the way. No. Alfred and I will find our own way back- by ourselves. Now, if you'll excuse me, Alfred and I need to find a place to rest tonight. No doubt we'll be on the move again on the morning."

With that, Alfred moved off, his whistle blowing as he vanished into the night. Argyle shook his head at what he'd just witnessed. "I think I've got some questions for Sunny in the morning about this Allura woman."

Sophie had succesfully dropped off the oil tankers and was now working light engine back to Falmouth. Pipp watched speed carefully as they dropped through Penrhyn. "Speed restriction soon," she said. "Keep an eye out for the red light."

As they proceeded down the hill, suddenly the cab AWS alarm went off. Pipp cancelled it, but suddenly the track began to throw them around. "What the? Where's the red light?"

Braking had minimal effect, and they shot through the section alarmingly fast. Behind them, there were loud breaking and cracking sounds, and this concerned Pipp. When they arrived at the next station she stopped Sophie and told the signalman about what had happened.

"I'll send the danger code," the signalman said. I'll notify the station master and suggest he head down the line with you."

When he was ready, the pair walked back to where Pipp had heard the strange noises. The station master shone his torch- and his jaw dropped in surprise. Much of the embankment underneath the tracks had fallen away, leaving a gaping hole in the ground, and the track was suspended, dangling in the air.

"That's not good," he said. "An engine clearly went through that at well above the permitted speed."

"Well, that's the odd thing," Pipp said. "We never saw a red light to warn us to start slowing down, the first news I got was the AWS going off."

"We'll investigate in the morning."

Sure enough, the next morning brought light- and some answers. "There's the culprit," said a workman, showing a bottle. "This gas bottle was connected up to the sign on the other side- but it ran out partway through the night as it hadn't been refilled properly. Still, rebuilding this embankment and putting the track back in will take a while."

Luckily, there were plenty of people and engines ready to help.

Author's Note

This chapter combines the plotlines of the Thomas and Friends episode of the same name and the Tell your Tale episode No Place Like Home. As adaptations go, this may seem like an odd pair to combine, but I found they went curiously well together. Given what we now know about Allura, it makes her backstory quite tragic-the fact she simply wants to get home gives her a fair deal of sympathy, sympathy Opaline never deserved.

The crash sequence at the end of the chapter is based on two different incidents. The landslip element is taken from the Chicken Curve collapse on the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway, where a GWR-era embankment that had been built poorly gave way and cut the line in two. The depleted gas bottle is taken from the Nuneaton Crash, which occurred when a warning light for a speed restriction failed due to running out of fuel. An express train entered the section going at four times the permitted speed and derailed, badly damaging the station in the process and killing six people.