TalesFromHasegawaValley Ch3

The Upper Valley Railway is not that big of a railway. Many people have said that there needs to be a branch line, where people in more rural communities to get to the main city much faster than driving there by road.

Amon Fujiwara, the controller of the Upper Valley Railway, decided to finally open one, but he didn’t have any engines available to run the line. With this in mind, he ordered a new engine from Europe.

The engine in particular was named Kazuma. He was very excited about getting his own Branch Line. He was also very fast, which explained why he seemed to arrive 5 days ahead of when he was expected. It also explained all the little chips on his bright blue paint. The Big Controller greeted him warmly.

“Before you are to work on the Branch Line,” he explained to Kazuma, “you are to first take a practice coal run around the valley. Please remember that some of the lines run along the Narrow Gauge lines, so you might run into much smaller engines.”

“Yes sir,” said Kazuma, although he really was paying no attention to what the Big Controller had said. He was just focused completely on doing his job. He sped off to the yard to collect the trucks.

At the yard, Mori was shunting the trucks into place. He had just finished shunting several empty trucks into a siding when Kazuma arrived. “Hurry up and get out of the way,” said Kazuma, “I don’t want to be late.”

Mori blinked. He knew Kazuma was coming, but he didn’t expect him to be rude. “You have two whole hours!” he said before backing down onto another siding. Kazuma was quickly coupled up and left before Mori could say anything else.

When Kazuma arrived at the coal yard with his trucks, Smudger had just finished shunting the coal trucks onto the loader. The machines rumbled and went to work, but it wasn’t fast enough for Kazuma.

“Come on, speed that thing up!” he snapped as he waited impatiently for his trucks to be loaded.

Smudger was cross. “These thing take time!” he yelled up to Kazuma, “Besides, it can’t go any faster!”

Kazuma was not at all late by the time the machine finished loading his trucks, but he thought he was anyway. Before his driver could stop him, he had begun to pull out of the siding. His driver quickly stopped him and waited for the signal ahead to clear. Kazuma growled in impatience. As soon as the signal dropped, he slipped his brake and sped off.

Kazuma loved coasting down the valley. The cool wind rushed around his face, his wheels pounded the rails, and the trucks rumbled smoothly behind him. He hummed a little tune to himself.

They eventually had to stop at a signal. Candy was coming down the side of the mountain with a train full of slate. She had to be careful as to not rock the trucks, but Kazuma was, once again, getting impatient.

“Hurry up, tin can!” he snapped at her. Candy was very cross. Nobody had called her a name like that since Royal had left.

At last, Candy was clear out of the way. Kazuma shot off once again, desperate to make up for the time he thought he had lost.

He found himself passing through an older line, with several dead trees and not many signals. He beamed and began to speed up, his wheels pounding the old rails. The rusted-out rails made a peculiar creaking sound as he sped down the line. His driver began to worry, but all seemed fine.

He finally screeched to a stop at the other end of the line. He was just catching his breath when Miharu arrived to collect the trucks. “I saw you speeding ahead of me,” she said, “and you were going dangerously fast.”

“I know,” beamed Kazuma, “Isn’t it great?”

Miharu blinked. “What?” she asked, somewhat confused.

“I love the rush!” laughed Kazuma, “I love thundering down the line, feeling the wind hit my face as my wheels pound the rails beneath me!” He stopped his rambling, and then looked over at her. “You know,” he said, “maybe we could have a race someday? You seemed to be pretty good competition…”

Miharu giggled and blushed a bit. “I’m not all that fast,” she giggled, “But…”

Her face suddenly went very stern-looking and she glared at him. “You should have slowed down. Somebody could have gotten hurt,” she murmured, her voice suddenly not as happy-sounding as before.

Kazuma stared at her, and then laughed. “Please!” he snorted, “I’ll be fine! I’ve done this a lot of times, and NEVER had an accident. If there’s any real danger, I’d know it.”

And before Miharu could tell him off, he had pulled away from the station, leaving the trucks on the platform instead of shunting them onto the siding. This left Miharu to have to switch onto another line before she could collect them. “The nerve of him!” she grumbled furiously.

Kazuma ran around to a turntable to take his trip back to the mainline. “No passing trains,” said his driver, “just heard it from the signalman.”

Kazuma grinned excitedly. “This is the rush I was waiting for…” he whispered to himself.

With that, before his driver and fireman were ready he slipped his brake and took off down the line. His wheels pounded the rail, his eyes squinted as the wind blew across his face, and everything around him began to blur.

Up ahead, he could see the station where the Big Controller was waiting for him. His driver tried to apply the brakes as they drew near the platform.

Nothing.

Kazuma suddenly realized what had happened. He had slipped his own brake a few too many times, and now it was simply refusing to go back down.

By the time his driver managed to slip the brakes on. It was too late. Kazuma shut his eyes as he slid through the station, his wheels screeching so loud that everybody had to cover their ears. This was followed by a loud SMASH followed by a BAM, and everybody turned toward the end of the station to look.

Kazuma had smashed through the ending buffers of the station and right through the restraining wall at the end. His front wheels and buffers were dangling off the edge. He gulped nervously and looked down. It wasn’t too far down of a drop, but he would probably wreck the road beneath him. And if he kept going, he’d smash right into a restaurant.

The Big Controller came up, very cross. “I spent a good fortune on you and THIS is what I get?!” he snapped, pointing down at his damaged buffers.

Kazuma sighed miserably. “I’m sorry sir,” he muttered miserably.

The Big Controller turned around, grumbling as he thought to himself. He sighed and turned back around to Kazuma. “Since you’re new, I’ll give you a second chance,” he said as EM and Smudger arrived to pull Kazuma free, “but no more reckless speeding. No engine is ready to work here if they’re not ready to obey their driver’s controls.”


A few weeks later, Kazuma returned. His buffers were repaired and he was repainted with the Hasegawa Valley uniform color. This ticked off Retsu, as he was still in his red-oxide livery.
Waiting for him on the platform were two gleaming green coaches. He quickly coupled up to them and bolted to the station.

He was just getting ready to depart when several little boys ran up. “Hey!” they cried, “You’re the engine in the picture!”

“What picture?” snorted Kazuma.

“The picture of you hanging off that wall!” the boys laughed, “The restaurant across the street took a picture of when you almost dropped in for sushi!”

The boys laughed, and a red-faced embarrassed Kazuma chuffed away.

*END*