The Island's Swansong

II - First Contact

Scrambling for my torch, I raced to shine a light, to gaze upon a real face, upon a real train. Pushing the switch, I angled the torch's beam. Angular side tanks, three pairs of driving wheels with an external, rectangular piston emerged as the concentration of photons peeled back the darkness. Dust and rust clung over most of the mottled paintwork. In a handful of areas tinges of red and pink showed through. A dented golden lamp sat atop her funnel.

I walked around, getting a better view of the front. There was no smokebox door. In its place was the largest, roundest face I'd ever seen, blotchy in places with soot, but I could make out freckles. The eyes, my God they were big, the size of basketballs. They stared at me with the power and weight of a deity. I felt minute and fragile by comparison. So much was held within her gaze: pain, suffering, loneliness. I drew the torch beam away as to avoid scaring her.

Rosie.

"Are you a vandal?" she asked, a flicker of fear in her voice, "Or a thief? Are you here to steal parts?"

"No no," I held up my hands, "I'm an urban explorer."

"Explorer? What is there to explore?" a confused expression reshaped her face. Her voice was loud, the reason why unclear to me. Maybe because of her size, or the smokebox helped amplify it. So many questions...

"I like exploring old and abandoned places," I explained, "To see if anything is left behind, or if there's anything that can explain why they're abandoned."

"Oh," Rosie blinked, "What have you found so far?"

"Nothing," I put my hands down, "No people, no engines. It's like the island was deserted en masse."

"I have no idea how long I've been here," Rosie began, "My driver and fireman put me in here and said when the railway re-opened, I'd be brought out to shunt the trains." Her voice paused, cracking under its own mental recollections, and wishes. "But they never came back..."

"The railway never re-opened," I gazed around the shed. Ivy crept in through broken skylights. Night was crawling in from outside. This was to be my accommodation.

I began unpacking, unclipping the sleeping bag from my backpack. "What are you doing?" Rosie enquired.

"I'm camping here tonight," I revealed some baked beans and a mini stove from within the backpack, "We'll have plenty of time to talk."

"It's been so long since I had company," Rosie closed her eyes, remembering back to the days when she huffed about the yard, shunting trucks and sorting freight. I got the beans on to cook, and wolfed down a few minutes later. Propping the torch against my bag to spread some light through the cavernous sheds, I got comfortable on my sleeping bag. "You worked at Vicarstown, right?"

"Yes. I was the station pilot."

"Do you know what happened to the other engines?" I drew a pen and small black notebook out of my trouser pocket.

"Not many," Rosie furrowed her brow, "I know Sir Topham sold off what he could. I think most went back to their respective lines and sheds here on the Island. Wellsworth, Tidmouth, Ffarquhar."

"Right," I made a note.

"Do you know what happened to any of them?" Rosie cast me an eager stare.

"I've tracked down a few," I turned to a previous page. I'd made a list before coming here. "Stepney is back at the Bluebell, Winston is at the STEAM Museum in Swindon. A number of diesel shunters, 08s, are spread around the mainland, all repainted. They were hard to trace, but I think Diesel, Arry and Bert are still straining their buffers. Paxton and Sidney were lucky enough to be picked up by heritage lines, the Llangollen and East Lancashire."