ROTWOTA: Book 3 - Resistance, Rebellion, and Revenge

Trouble for the Locomotives

April 19

The previous day was uneventful for Nico, Aiden, Diesel 10, and the British locomotives, safe for having to prepare a plethora of weaponry, evacuation trains, and supplies to keep the soldiers and refugees alive. The workload sure kept him busy, he thought to himself. Nico couldn't help but think of 1478 and the others. Who knew how much longer it would be until shit hit the fan.

Moments after shunting a long train of guns, Nico was approached by Benson, whom he was already tired of. "Attention, Attention! It had be brought to my attention American, that you are to be brought alongside Aiden the brown one to help us search, the men have discovered things lurking nearby and they've got intent to hunt it down," he ordered.

Nico had heard of monstrous things, yet he considered himself lucky with his lack of encounters so far with them. It seemed as though the J94 wasn't given much of a choice, however.

"When do we leave?" he asked. "At approximately 2030 hours, as that is when the men say it'll be the most active and will come out. And there is also a last train due for arranging at 1300 hours, then you may rest more for your journey!" ordered Benson. Nico sighed as the B12 went off, at least he had a bit more time to rest his wheels.

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8:45 PM

"Alright everyone! Get on the train, we're taking you somewhere safe!"

Spencer and Rebecca had been at it for half an hour now, and they had to leave soon. The guards half a mile out hadn't spoken back in a little bit, but the two big engines figured they had enough time to get everyone out of there. But in the meantime, they couldn't help but ponder about the outside world, and one place in particular.

"Man I hope the others back on Sodor will handle this a bit better than we can here. It's...just going to be hard telling them about Nia," said Rebecca. "Yeah...but we have to focus on this now and hope nothing bad like that happens again, and we gotta hope nothing like that occurs again," said Spencer.

"Of course, you have to hope. But that only prolongs the inevitable."

The gruff voice caught them off guard, especially since no one nearby sounded like that or loud enough for Spencer to hear. He could've thought he was hearing things or it was just his imagination, but it wasn't in truth.

"I see you. If you want, I'll let you run."

"Shoot, Rebecca, RUN!" yelled Spencer. But the time he was given only amounted to a few seconds. In an instant from there, a tall dog-like figuring glowing a reddish-green aura teleported over the tracks. Neither the passengers or either of the two big engines had seen such a thing, or weren't caught off guard.

Everyone on Spencer's platform climbed aboard as fast as they could, but when he tried to off, the figure simply laughed and raised his furry arm. From it fired a fireball as big as his torso, which landed right on Spencer's boiler as he began to race away. He screamed in pain from the burning, unable to stop even if he wanted to.

As he and the coaches disappeared from view, the dog man, Maximus, looked back at Rebecca, who was frozen with fear. His stare with red eyes warned her not to move, even when several anthro soldiers had her and her train surrounded.

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9:24 PM

"It's getting dark out here and we've been out for a while, maybe we should head back before something ambushes us out here," said Aiden. "Maybe, let's just check the station up here," said Haley. "Yeah, then I guess we'll leave it off and hope it doesn't come to eat us in our sleep or something," grumbled Joesph.

Approaching the station in question, Nico couldn't help but reminisce about life before what had happened. He'd only ever been stopped here a few times, but it was nice to remember those days when the sun shone bright on the rails and Diego would be next to him in a better mood than his usual complainer self.

He soon snapped back to reality as he heard orders barking from the commander soldier to the others. "Now men, we must keep an eye out and make sure we don't get ambushed because we can't send backup!" said one of the sergeants. Nico looked over at Joesph next to him who did the same. "You, Nico, I'll watch this side, you stay looking in front," he said. "Ok then, I suppose," grumbled Nico.

Nothing happened for the next several minutes, and it was dark outside to the point where Nico was tempted to fall asleep. And he probably would've had it not been for soldiers shouting at something up ahead. Up from the hills, a figure stumbled towards them and stopped a few meters away. He had features that looked distinctly human, yet had yellow fur and blood over some of his body with one clearly affected ear and a tail.

"What the shit?" asked Joesph. "I don't know what you've been through, buddy, but it's a good idea to explain yourself." "Yeah, what happened to you?" asked Haley. Soon, a few of the other soldiers came right up close to him, and one even nudged him with his gun. Just then, Nico remembered the figure from what he'd been told but had somewhat gone out of memory.

Before the others could react, Elliot grabbed both the arm and gun of one of the soldiers before snickering. "You know, the smart ones would've run when they saw the blood," he said as he looked up, showing dark and evil eyes. From there, his body began to contort as his face as well as his skin and bones seemed to split open at the joints and tendrils leeches from every hole in his body that it could, with many of them quickly stabbing the soldier's body and killing him quickly. The other soldiers who approached were nigh-frozen with fear and quickly ran back to the engines as they all took off backwards. Soon enough, however, Elliot had pierced and hollowed out much of the soldier's body and threw him aside before racing after his next prey whilst screeching incessantly.

The soldier that got aboard Joesph and his driver shot at the thing as it rushed at them, but it shrugged them off with an unnatural endurance. Nico looked into where Elliot's face had previously been, and it was replaced by a giant maw that he figured anyone killed by it was unlucky. Despite that and the screeching, he did his best to pay no mind and just kept rushing backwards alongside the others as they went beyond their limits.

Unfortunately, none of them realized until it was too late that the points had been switched for Haley and Aiden to be diverted away while Nico and Joesph had been sent into a yard off the line they had been running along, finding themselves backing into buffers and a line of trucks respectively. By then, the thing was well aware its prey was trapped and soon went into the line where the two tank engines were. It approached them slowly and stopped only a couple meters away as the trembled in panic. But for a few moments, Elliot's face returned to normal and stared into Nico's, who recognized a face that didn't want to do this but had no choice.

Just then, it began to mutate even further, growing taller and stronger every second, more tendrils came from his body, his face grew even more messed up, and he was even more of a nightmare to look at. However, several of these tendrils soon reached over to the faces and cabs of the two engines. Nico shut his eyes and braced for his end, but never came, instead he heard screaming and smelled burning in the distance which soon got closer before passing by. Thankfully, the creature that was Elliot titled its head and must've thought that would've been a better meal, and so went in that direction.

Nico and Joesph were out of breath yet thankful for their luck, but the latter soon checked on Aiden and Haley, both of whom were fine, but they soon told about Spencer. Both tank engines went solemnly silent for a moment before those in Joesph's cab went forward, planning to meet back up with the others, only to see much of the track in front of them twisted and broken, meaning they were sitting ducks.

As Joesph grumbled at how they couldn't be helped until tomorrow, Nico was left in his thoughts. Everything about how the others at Biltmore were doing, but also about Elliot, and what he saw in those eyes, almost as if things couldn't be going worse for him.

However, unbeknownst to anyone in the group, a certain light blue dog-like figure was perched on the rooftop but staying hidden regardless, watching them with interest.