July, 27. 1998.

So, me and the other crews were talking last night about what we should do next, but while we were talking, we realised Topham wasn't with us. Then, I realized I hadn't seen him since we were at Elsbridge after we found Thomas, so somehow no one noticed he was gone for like 3 days!? We'll have to go back and find him somehow.

Just as we were discussing what to do, we heard a long and loud whistle approaching, and into the yard came Edward, Bill and Ben! We were shocked to see the China Clay twins alive, but they were in pretty rough shape. We asked them what happened and they said that when the raced backwards, they crashed into the back of the shed and derailed. Murdoch was chasing them, but after he heard the other engines leaving, he went after them, and they stayed derailed for about a day until Edward found them. Then they had to find a crane to re-rail them, so that's why it took so long for them to get here.

Now that we know the twins are safe, we decided to lay low for a bit. Thomas wanted a chance to stretch his wheels since he was feeling a bit better, and said he would head back to Elsbridge to try and find Topham, and Percy said he would join him. They set off with a flatbed in front and a coal truck behind. shortly after they left, I then had an idea; I thought we should head down the mainline a little to see if anyone is roaming around. Henry volunteered to go with us, so we agreed, and left.

We made our way down the line, and it felt very off. I'm used to seeing Gordon thundering down the line with the express, but I know I'll never see that again. We made a quick stop at Maron, and didn't see any signs of anyone being there, so we continued on. We barely went that far when Henry remembered seeing that Derek went down the old branchline, so we went to look for him.

Well, we found Derek, but he didn't make it. It seemed he basically did exactly what Gordon did, except instead of stoping in the barn, he stopped in a huge pile of dirt. We quickly left the scene and continued down the line.

We pulled into Abbey, and still no sign of anyone. We talked with Henry's crew, asking if they thought heading to Killdane was a good idea. They were nervous, but decided we should check it.

We decided to enter through the yard side. Henry said he would check the station while we check the yard. We quietly entered the yard as after hearing what James told us, we didn't want to alert any men or even Murdoch. We soon reached the far side of the yard, unfortunately, we didn't find anyone, so we went out to the station to meet up with Henry.

We found Henry sitting at one of the station platforms and he seemed to be talking to someone; we pulled up beside him and it turned out that he was talking to a member of the military who had been sent to scope out Sodor to find any survivors. The soldier quickly told us that if we knew where any other engines were, he would need their help as the military was about to send out a message to anyone still alive on Sodor to meet at Knapford or Crovan's Gate for some evacuation trains to take them to the Mainland. I hopped out of the cab and told the soldier about our group at Wellsworth and he was very thankful for the help. After making a call to the general, he hitched a ride with us for our journey back to Wellsworth.

We soon arrived back, and the soldier told the engines about the evacuation trains, and here's what we got settled. Henry, Edward, and Duck would go to Knapford for those evacuation trains, while Neville and BoCo would go to Crovan's Gate. The others were asked to stay here until further notice unless one of those things show up and they need to leave. These evacuation trains would start in a few hours, so we still got some time to kill. I then remembered Thomas and Percy, so we got settled for a while as we waited on Thomas and Percy.

Not even 20 minutes later, we heard 2 frantic whistles coming from down the line; it was Thomas and Percy! They raced past us bunker first going faster than we had ever seen them go, following behind them was the orange creature himself! Me and Erick quickly jumped into Duck's cab and the soldier decided to join us as he had a gun. I quickly through open Duck's regulator and we took off after them!

We sped down the line as fast as we could! We saw Murdoch just in front of us, with Thomas and Percy not that far ahead. I saw Murdoch was quickly closing in on the tank engines as we raced up and over Gordon's hill, suddenly, Duck blew his whistle loud and long to try and stop Murdoch! Murdoch suddenly braked hard and he was now behind us! The soldier shot at the beast which gave us some time to get away. Duck was able to catch up to the tank engines and bashed into their flatbed! Murdoch quickly caught up to us again being a 9F, meaning he could go much faster than any of these tank engines could go. The soldier kept shooting at the thing, but it did no good as he stretched his long gross tounge towards us! It grabbed onto Duck's bunker and started to slow us down! The soldier shot at the tung and it got split in half as Murdoch braked from being in pain.

We suddenly got switched onto the Peel Godred branch, and I had an idea. I hoped the siding where Paxton was crashed would make Murdoch derail or at least slow him down enough for us to get away, and I was right. Once he caught up again, he swerved into the siding and smashed into the back of Paxton's train! We all breathed a sigh of relief as we charged on down the line towards the Ironworks.

We soon pulled into the Ironworks, and it was silent. We didn't even bother looking for Diesel 10 and the twins, so we went to rest in some sidings in the yard; so much for that evacuation train, I'm hoping Henry and Edward can handle them, if not, there will have to be other arrangements made. I'll write in here tomorrow, as I'm still very shaken up from that chase; along with everyone else.