The Island's Swansong

XI - The Truth About Ten

When you become so acquainted with an individual, you subconsciously record every fine detail about them. In the case of an engine, I recognised him down to the rivets, the bogie mechanics, even the buffer beam layout.

Yet there was one glaring omission.

My eyes kept being drawn to the roof. There was indeed a claw on Ten's roof, but not the one I was expecting. Pinchy was nowhere to be seen.

But the Grabber was.

The humungous metal monster, the very same four-fingered menace who'd tried to catch Stepney, had collapsed from its mechanism, landing squarely on top of Ten's roof. Ten's body was dented, misshapen so it dipped in the centre, even warping his chassis frame.

"Why are you beneath the Grabber?" I asked the obvious question.

"Is that what you call it?" Ten replied, "With so many engines, and little money at the time, the mechanics of this place were worked to the bone." His gaze looked up towards the rusting monument on his roof. "Then the influx of engines came in. Up until that point we'd only melted down their parts. Scrapping whole engines added extra strain to the equipment. Then one day, I was parked here, and the beams and pulley chains above gave out. The claw plummeted to the ground, pinning me to this very spot. At that point, health and safety stepped in. They deemed the site too dangerous. The operators opted to shut it down instead of undertaking site-wide repairs, which were too costly. The doors were closed and I've been here ever since."

"You melted down engines?" my breath left my body colder than when it entered. Perhaps he was as they said...

"I didn't want to," Ten averted his gaze, "I'd grown quite fond of some of them, and tolerated even the worst of them. But a job's a job."

"What was your job on the island?"

"I was a special order, co-designed by Sir Topham," Ten began, "He wanted a diesel small enough to run around the yard organising trains, but big enough to take trains along the main line. I helped organise scrap to be melted down, and delivered freshly made iron and steel to various points on the island."

I stayed quiet, the revelation feeling somewhat benign. It didn't sound very villainous. "There have been stories told about you," I approached the topic with sensitivity, "Did you ever carry a claw of your own on your roof?"

"Not besides this one," Ten replied, "And I've never carried this anywhere."

"Which means none of them could be real?" I surmised.

"None of what?"

"The stories," I clarified, "About you being an evil diesel chasing engines round the island, stealing items, smashing sheds and the like."

"I never chased anyone," Ten huffed, "Sure, I had a dislike of steam engines when I first arrived. They hissed about me as they knew I broke up their parts. Rumours milled that I'd push them into the Smelting pit, or be their executioner when Sir Topham deemed them too old, though I guess they were right on that one in the end." He took a deep, strong breath. "But I was reluctant."

The diesel, anything but sinister, took a moment to gather his main recollections. "I did try and get back at one or two... problem engines. Nothing more than smashing some buffers to humiliate them when they least expected it."

A sheer coincidence, or stretched inspiration? My mind began to wonder. "What about the Lost Engine? Or the Conductor Family?"

"I only recall one lost engine," Ten squinted as he recalled, "A small golden tank engine. Ended up here on a foggy night. 'Arry and Bert thought bringing him inside would be a great joke."