Beginings

A bunch of quick snapshots of the very very begining of all the main casts lives on the NWR. This used to be the begining of the main story, but I changed it to something... well better. This was written when I was still getting a feel for everyone and their charecters. You could say, this is where the adventure begins.

Alan Rowley

1950

A loud ringing came through his Hardwick apartment. He quickly ran to the phone,

“Hello?”

“Ah good afternoon, is this Mr Rowley?” The tired voice called, she sounded rather happy though.

“Y-yes? Who is this?”

“I’m Sarah, I’m calling to tell you that you got the job as Sir Topham Hatts assistant. Congratulations.”

Alan was absolutely speechless, “Really?”

“Yep! You start on monday, you’ll get a worker's apartment in Wellsworth. But we’ll tell you all this on the day. For now, congratulations”, Alan finally shook himself out of his shock enough to stutter out a thank you.

That Monday, he had all of his stuff with him (He really didn’t have much, and he’d get the rest in Wellsworth), and waited on the station platform. Holding his ticket tightly in his hands.

Panicking.

Soon enough, a green diesel came along, with an inbuilt coach.

“Get in quickly please!” she called. Alan just followed the crowd of people, before finally sitting in one of the chairs.

Sighing as they sped along the rails to Arlesburgh, and then Knapford.

Steven Watkins

1950

Steven sighed as he walked onto Knapford station. He was quite lucky to get this job, as hundreds of people applied, and there were only two slots open. He stepped into his new boss's office, and stood next to a blonde haired man. He recognised him from the interview. A man with a black top hat, and black suit walked in.

"Hello hello hello! You two must be my new assistants! My name is Sir Topham Hatt!" He said, smiling warmly.

"Have you two met before?"

"No sir", the blonde said, shaking his head.

"Ah, well. This is Alan!" Hatt gestured to the blonde.

"And this is Steven!" Hatt gestured to the brunette.

"Now, this railway runs on teamwork and collaboration. I expect you both to not only get on with each other, but also get along with your other co-workers. And be really useful. Understood?"

"Yes sir!" They both said in unison.

"Fantastic! Dismissed."

Steven took his coat out of the box Sir Topham Hatt had left in their office. He held it for a moment before putting it on, it had a good weight to it. He turned to face his new co-worker

"It's a pleasure to meet you!" Steven said smiling.

Alan glanced at the brunette, and gave a small faint smile

"it's nice to meet you too".

Charlie Sand

1947

The driver turned to the fireman.

“Go on, choose one. Any of them.”

“You sure?”

“yeah course.”

Charlie walked up to the engines. He could make out what they were saying before they stopped after noticing him,

“Driver won’t choose you again!” one of the biggest engines said “He wants a strong engine. Like us”.

Charlie scowled, and looked over, the engine was small for a tender engine. And looked rather sad.

The fireman approached him

“Would you like to come out today?” he asked. The engine seemed rather surprised. But agreed very quickly

“Oh yes please sir!”

The fireman motioned for the driver to come over.

“This one?” he asked. Charlie nodded. “Alright. Hop up when you're ready, Sand”.

Charlie looked over to the engine “What's your name?”

“Edward sir!”

“It's nice to meet you Edward! I'm Charlie Sand. I'll be your fireman”

1949

“You're retiring?!” Edward and Charlie shouted.

“Yes lads, I know it's sudden, I’m sorry. Though I have some good news too” The driver said walking towards Charlie, handing him a small badge.

‘N.W.R Number 2

Charlie Sand

Driver’

“I wanted to give you the news myself. You’ll have a relief fireman for a few months before you get a full time one.” He said.

Charlie was nearly on the verge of tears,

“Thank you.”

“Now come on you two! One last ride around the main line.” the old driver called hopping up into the cab.

Sidney Hever

1949

“This is Tidmouth sheds. Your driver picked number 2. Names Edward”, The worker said gesturing in the direction of the sheds.

“Oh okay, thanks mate”, Sidney said with a smile, the worker nodded and went back to his work.

Sidney walked into the sheds, crews gave glances but the engines stared at him. He could just over hear the general mumbled chatter

“Who's that?” a blue tank engine asked,

“New fireman looks like” replied a green tender engine,

“Fireman?? Who’s getting a new fireman??” a smaller red one added,

“back up crew perhaps?” a huge blue engine said,

“but I like my current fireman”, a green tank engine whined.

He finally located his steamie, a small tender engine, the train was painted in a bright blue, with red lining, a colour scheme that screamed the N.W.R.

The tender engine’s driver (who clearly noticed the mumbling from the other trains,) popped out from inside the cab.

“Oh hiya! You’re our new fireman I’m guessin’?”,

“Yep that's me! Are you Edward?”, the brunette raised an eyebrow and the engine chuckled

“what? No that's Edward.” he said gesturing to the blue engine, “I’m Charlie”,

“oh. Crap, I’m sorry” Sidney said, laughing slightly at himself. The blue engine spoke up first,

“oh! Don’t worry, more people make that mistake than you think.”, Edwards voice was gentle, if a little tired sounding. It put Sidney at ease a bit.

“Can I ask your name sir?”

Now this surprised him, engines didn’t typically ask for the names of the crew, usually only referring to them as ‘driver’, ‘fireman’ or ‘guard’. It was definitely a welcome gesture though,

“Oh, uh. Right! Yeah, I’m Sidney”, Edward smiled warmly at him,

“well it's a pleasure to meet you Sidney”.

“You wanna hop up then?” Charlie said, nodding towards the cab.

“Yep! Right behind ya!”.

Bob Field

1947

Bob practically ran into his friend Joseph on Bridge North platform,

"Woah! Hey what happened?" The Stationmaster asked, steadying the young Fireman.

"I got the job at Arlesdale! In Sodor!!"

"No way! When do you start?"

"Next month!"

Bob was practically bouncing with excitement, he'd wanted to move to Sodor for so long, and now he'd finally gotten that opportunity.

"You'll write won't you? Can't just abandon me here" Joseph laughed,

"oh of course I will! Mate if I had a camera you'd be getting tons of pictures"

"So what engine is it?"

"It's on the miniature railway! He's the red one... Mike!"

“So you’ll be a proper driver!?”

“YEAH!”

The two sat down on a bench outside the breakroom. Bob was just about calming down from the excitement.

"I hate to ruin the mood but… you'll be safe won't you? I don't know how similar Sodor is to England for… well, people like you".

Bob sighed, putting a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder

"I'll be fine mate. Who knows, I might even find someone"

"If you find a partner before me I'll eat my hat "

Tony Garner

1952

“Ah! Hullo there!” he heard a voice call “Are you Antony Garner?”

Tony nodded and walked towards the man. He was a short man with a tall top hat.

“My name is Sir Topham Hatt. this is your Driver Field”

Tony looked over to a man standing next to a blue tank engine. 'Field' glanced over and gave a small smile and wave, which Tony returned.

"Robert this, as you’ve probably guessed. Is your Fireman Garner. And this” Sir Topham Hatt (The First) gestured towards the Blue E2 “This is Thomas. Our number one Tank Engine”, Thomas smiled awkwardly. “I’ll let the three of you get to know each other. But I expect you both in the yard by 9!”.

Tony glanced over at the Driver again.

“Ah fuck. He’s cute”, he thought as he stepped over.

“Hullo!”,

“H-Hullo!”.

"I'm Bob by the way. It's nice to meet you", The driver said, smiling awkwardly,

"Ah! It's good to meet you. I'm Tony"

“So How long have you been working as a fireman for?”,

“4 years on the skarloey railway. You?”,

“3 on the mainland as a trainee, and 3 on the Arlesdale Railway.”, Tony nodded and turned to Thomas.

“What about you then mate? How long have you been on the N.W.R?”,

“I’m not sure… I arrived in the 1910s I think?”,

“... Okay. we’ll trust your lead.” Tony said, chuckling.

Roy Walsh

1954

Roy stepped into his new office. The other Stationmaster, Matthew, had told him to

“Get sorted there, then I’ll walk you through platform duty”, he picked up a long blue coat from the desk and held it up, it was around knee length, and was fairly heavy. It was nice and warm when he put it on, which was appreciated on this cold winter day.

He placed the hat gently on his head, smoothing out his hair. And stared at his reflection in the window.

This was happening

For the first time, he looked around. The walls were a light green, with a wooden border along the bottom. The one way window looked out to the platform, and had a ledge which was deep enough to sit on.

The desk was clean (for now), and had a small lamp and telephone, with a chair on either side, with many different draws.

Speaking of which, there were some draws on the back wall too, with a fax machine on top.

It took all his strength not to jump for joy and he made his way out of the small office and back to the platform.

As soon as he found his new coworker, a flag and whistle got placed in his hands.

“Stop Emily. She's the dark green engine who's about to come down.” Matthew explained quickly “Tell her to pick up the flowers from the docks and bring them back here.”

Roy nodded, and stood at the platform edge. Waiting for Emily.

Soon enough she came barreling down. He raised the red flag and blew his whistle quickly as she came to a stop. He walked up

“Hullo! Uh, you need to get flowers from… the docks?” she peeped happily

“Hello there! We’ll be right over.”

Her driver stopped her, putting on her brakes,

“What docks?”

“uh”, Matthew suddenly shouted over

“BRENDHAM!” the driver nodded and they drove off.

“First rule of being a Stationmaster. Don’t trust a word I say, I’ll forget something” Matthew laughed running up to him “Sorry!”

Harry Rogers

1954

The trucks laughed and jeered at the new blonde worker.

"SHUT UP". Harry shouted. They continued to taunt him "you don't scareeee us!"

Albert the yard manager looked over at the sudden commotion, and walked over. He promptly bopped one of the trucks with his shunters pole

"you heard the man. Shut it".

He turned to the blonde

"you alright?",

"Y-yeah.. thank you"

Albert smiled "lil bastards these ones, they're new. Don't worry about it. Eddy will put them in their place".

Harry stared out the window of the breakroom, he sighed as he drank his (terrible tasting, if he was being honest.) tea.

"god. I could bearly keep them in order. How do they do it.." he thought sadly

"Hey?"

Harry jumped, the new Knapford Stationmaster stood next to him.

"H-hi!"

"Are you alright? Heard you got in some trouble with the trucks." His voice was kind and friendly. His cap was under his arm, showing his neatly combed black hair (the

"Y-yeah..." He jumped a little at the hand on his shoulder, looking up at the man.

"don't worry too much about it. Everyone's had a run in with the trucks at some point." The Stationmaster said warmly. "It's why I don't like working in the yard", he joked.

Harry laughed a little at that.

"Good luck with them. Hope the next lot go easy on ya", "thank you".

Harry watched as the man walked off into the crowded breakroom