The Island of Sodor is a magical place filled with many wonders and sights. There are breathtaking views, wide open fields, spectacular seaside beaches, and mountains that stretch far and wide. The engines of the NWR all love the Island, and do everything they can to help maintain its beauty. You will often see Henry bringing crews around to forests to tend to the trees, or Harvey clearing the line of any disturbances, or Murdoch and Toby working near the farms to help tend to the animals.

All the engines play a critical role with keeping the Island running and beautiful, but there is one engine whose mere existence keeps the magic of the Island alive. This engine’s name is Lady. Lady is an engine of pure magic, and of pure mystery. No one truly knows where she came from, but they all know her purpose. Lady runs the special railway known to all as the Magic Railroad. This railway connects to all the magic forces on the Island, and even to other areas in the world, like Muffle Mountain in the Indian Valley over in the United States. Lady runs up and down the Magic Railroad to give it life and energy, which is transported throughout its various locations.

While Lady is a critical part to the mere existence and running of the engines of the NWR, few of them actually know her. Thomas has had the honor of meeting her twice, but both times were under rather rushed and dire circumstances, and the second time she had merely put herself into one of his dreams.

         One morning, Thomas was busily arranging some trucks in an old coal mine. This part of the line was not visited terribly often, and so Thomas only had the trucks for company. He didn’t mind though; they were actually quite friendly with the engine and were glad to actually be moving around. Thomas began playfully bumping them around into their sidings, and soon they were all laughing and giggling joyfully.

Thomas bumped some trucks over a set of points, with the intention of lining them up later. However, the last coal truck somehow traveled forward instead of into the siding. Thomas gave chase, mildly worried that it might cause some trouble. He found himself speeding up, as the truck was rolling down the track faster and faster, towards a lonely set of buffers. Thomas was sure that the truck would slam against the buffers and turn into smithereens, and so he shut his eyes to prevent himself from seeing the incident.

But the sound of a crash never came. Instead, the truck rolled right into the buffers, and with a rush of wind, a mysterious whistle and a colorful flash of lights, the truck disappeared! Thomas gasped in amazement, as memories flooded back to him.

“These are the buffers to the Magic Railroad!” he exclaimed. Looking to his side, he noticed something else. “And there’s the little grotto where the lost engine used to stop for water!”

“And here’s the lost engine who was found thanks to the help of a certain blue engine,” came a voice from beside him.

Thomas jumped, looked to his other side and did a double-take. There, sitting calmly on the rails next to him, with purple paint and gold lining shining in the sunlight, was Lady the Magic Engine!

Thomas was speechless, and he gaped wordlessly at Lady, completely unable to verbally convey anything. Lady merely smiled and said, “Hello, Thomas. It’s nice to see you again. It has been a while, hasn’t it?”

Thomas forced himself to calm down a bit so he could speak properly. “Y-y-yes, it has been, Lady,” he stuttered. “It’s lovely to see you again. W-w-what are you doing here? I thought the Magic Railroad needs you on it constantly?”

“I need to run on the Railroad every now and again to keep its energy up,” explained Lady, “but it can survive for a good while without me. I just wanted a nice run to stretch my wheels on Sodor rails.”

“Ah…” said Thomas understandingly. “I know what you mean. When I came home from my visit on the mainland, the best feeling I had was just to feel familiar rails under my wheels. All the same, I would like to visit the Magic Railroad again. It was a beautiful place, and I saw that there were rails leading to other places.”

Lady smiled broadly. “Well then, I suppose it couldn't hurt to have a good run on it again. Come, let me switch on to your line and we’ll get underway.”

         So Lady changed over to Thomas’ line, and the two engines made a charge towards the magic buffers. Lady went through a few seconds before Thomas did, and the little blue engine shut his eyes in anticipation. Then, instead of meeting the solid thump of the buffers, Thomas glided through and into the wonders of the Magic Railroad.

When Thomas opened his eyes, he gasped in delight and amazement at all the sights around him. The wondrous railway had scarcely changed since he had last seen it. Dazzling sights surrounded him, and everything was brightly colored and cheerful. Birds sang in the trees, water bubbled in the creeks and streams, and the sun shone brilliantly.

There was one significant difference that Thomas quickly noticed. When he was last here, there was only one long stretch of golden track, which led from the connection in Muffle Mountain to the buffers on Sodor. Now, there were golden rails everywhere, reaching in every direction, and almost all of them ended in sidings with sets of buffers that were identical to one another.

“Well… What’s all this then?” Thomas asked Lady. “There used to be one set of rails here, but now there are all of these!”

Lady smiled. “The Magic Railroad connects to more than just the Indian Valley, Thomas,” she explained. “When you were here, the railway had just come back to life after being out of energy for so many years. In the time that’s passed, the MRR has become fully revitalized, and now has all its connections fully functional. These other lines lead to other places and universes, wherever there are rails to lead them.”

Thomas’ eyes widened with wonder and amazement. “Do you mean that if I was to travel down one of these sidings, I’d end up somewhere other than Muffle Mountain?”

“Precisely!” said Lady. Then her attention swayed for a moment, as she seemed to look off into the distance. “Oh, I’m sorry Thomas, but I must go now. There are some things that I must attend to at once, and I’m afraid I can’t stay.”

“Lady!” Thomas called before the engine disappeared into one of the sidings. “Do you think it would be alright if I took a little journey down one of these lines? I’d love to see what other worlds there are that I can travel on.”

Lady considered for a moment before deciding. “I suppose that it couldn’t hurt,” she conceded. “But do take care, Thomas. What you may see in some of the words may surprise you.” And with that, she charged into a set of buffers and disappeared.

Thomas looked around for a moment to get his bearings, and then he focused on a set of buffers that seemed to stand out to him. He gathered strength in his wheels, and charged towards them. He moved without hesitation, and the points seemed to magically change in the right direction for him. As he approached the buffers, he shut his eyes once more, and with a loud blowing of his whistle, he disappeared.

         When Thomas opened his eyes, he found that he had indeed left the Magic Railroad. However, the new world he was in seemed just as bright and cheerful as the MRR was. The surrounding environment was filled with bright and cheerful colors, and overhead, a bright sun shone through a cloudless sky. The area around the rails was rather hilly, and trees obscured the tops of them, blocking Thomas from seeing anything beyond them.

“I might as well see what’s beyond them,” Thomas said out loud, and no sooner had the words left his mouth than he heard a squeal from the treeline. The little engine was taken aback. “H-hello?” he called out, nervously. “I-is anyone there?”

Thomas saw some rustling in the trees just above the rails, and he puffed carefully underneath them so as not to startle whatever he had encountered. “Hello?” he called out quietly again. “It’s alright, there’s nothing to be afraid of here. I’m not here to hurt you.”

The leaves and branches rustled some more, and then Thomas saw some squirrels pop their heads out to look at him. Thomas put on a comforting smile, but his expression changed to one of pure surprise at what he saw next. Some more branches moved aside, and there staring back at him was a bright yellow horse with a pink mane!!

Thomas did a double-take to make sure he wasn’t see things, and he wasn’t. The pony stared shyly back at him, with her mane hiding half of her face. Thomas also noticed that this pony had matching yellow wings on her body, which only surprised him even more.

“H-he-hello, there,” stuttered Thomas. “J-just how did you get up there? I didn’t think horses could climb trees.”

“FLUTTERSHY!!! HEY FLUTTERSHY, WHERE ARE YOU?!” The loud voice startled both Thomas and the pony. Thomas thought that the pony would disappear into the trees again, but instead, she jumped out of the trees in fright and landed on Thomas’ cab. Thomas rushed forward out of the trees in reaction, and the moment he did, he nearly bumped into a bright blue pony with a rainbow-colored mane!

“What the hay!?” exclaimed the pony. Thomas gasped in fright, and inadvertently, his whistle blew with a loud PEEEEEP! The pony jumped in fright as well, but instead of falling back to the ground, she stood in midair, flying with her own set of wings! Thomas and the pony stared speechlessly at each other for a few moments. Then she saw the pony cowering on Thomas’ cab.

“Hey! Fluttershy, there you are!” She flew over to the yellow pony, putting a reassuring hoof on her shoulder. “You alright? What happened here? Who’s this… guy?”

Thomas abruptly snapped out of his surprise and spoke to the rainbow-haired pony. “M-m-my name’s Thomas, the tank engine. A-and just who are you?! How are you talking?! Never mind that, how are you flying?!”

The pony responded with questions of her own. “And just who are YOU?! Just what are YOU doing here? How are YOU talking?!”

“Rainbow Dash, what’s going on here?!” came another voice. Thomas looked, and just in front of him stood a group of four other ponies, one purple, one orange, one white, and one bright pink. They all gasped when they saw Thomas, and then chaos broke out. All the ponies began speaking and shouting at once, and just as Thomas thought he would go crazy, his whistle went off again, silencing everyone.

“All right, what’s going on here?!” he demanded. “I’m seeing talking and flying horses for goodness’ sake!!! This shouldn’t be happening!!”

“And I’m seein’ a talkin’ train!” pointed out the rainbow-haired pony. “That ain’t supposed to be happening either!”

“Where I come from, trains can talk,” rebuked Thomas, “and so can many other things, but certainly not animals!”

“Why don’t we start this all over?” said the purple pony. “Let’s all explain a bit about ourselves so we can get a better picture?” The ponies agreed with her, and she turned to face Thomas again. “All right then, hello there. My name is Twilight Sparkle, and these are my friends,” she said, gesturing to each individual pony.

“Applejack’s the name,” said the orange-colored, yellow-haired pony. “I run Sweet-Apple Acres with my family. We spend our days apple-buckin’ the trees to harvest the apples.”

“My name is Rarity,” said the white-colored, purple-haired pony. “I am the shopkeeper of Carousel Boutique. I make spectacular dresses and gowns for ponies all over Equestria.”

“I’m Rainbow Dash,” said the blue-colored, rainbow-haired pony. “I’m in charge of clearing the skies over Ponyville. I’m also trying to get into the Wonderbolts!”

“I’m Pinkie Pie!!” exclaimed the pink-colored, pink-haired pony. “I help the Cakes run Sugarcube Corner. I’m the pony who loves to par-tay!!

“And…I-I, I’m Fluttershy…” said the yellow-colored, pink-haired pony. She was very nervous though, and tried to hide herself behind her mane.

Thomas took in the information as best he could, even though he didn’t understand half of it, considering the ponies were talking about places they knew about, and he didn’t.

“So,” finished Twilight, “just who are you? We’ve got trains in Equestria, but I’ve never seen one that can talk before.”

         Thomas glanced around sheepishly before answering. “My name’s Thomas. And I don’t come from this place… Equestria, was it?” Twilight nodded. “I come from the North-Western Railway, which is on the Island of Sodor. I live and work there with other engines, and we all do our part to make sure the railway is the finest one there is. All the engines there are able to talk too, although the rest of our world doesn’t seem to have talking engines. It’s probably because of the Magic Railroad.”

“The Magic what-now?” inquired Rainbow Dash.

“The Magic Railroad,” explained Thomas. “It was because of that I was able to travel here. You see…” And so Thomas explained to the 6 ponies all about Sodor and the Magic Railroad, and they explained about Equestria and how the land depended on the ponies to maintain it as well. Pegasus ponies, the ones with wings, saw to maintaining the weather across Equestria. Unicorns used their magic for a variety of things, including helping to change the seasons. Normal Earth ponies did lots of things, ranging from harvesting fields to helping out with stores and shops.

The seven were soon talking and laughing with each other like old friends, and the ponies offered to bring Thomas into Ponyville, the town where they lived. Thomas accepted, and they all traveled to the town at a brisk pace.

         When the group arrived, Thomas saw that the town was indeed inhabited by ponies, and there were a lot of them. Every one of them turned their heads to face Thomas as he slowly puffed into Ponyville’s station. Ponies big and small crowded around the tank engine, and they all murmured with wonder and amazement at the spectacle they saw before them.

Thomas bucked up courage once more, seeing that he would have to be the first one to start a conversation. “Hello everybo- err, I mean, hello everypony,” he said, correcting his words to match the dialect used by the ponies. “My name is Thomas. I’m pleased to meet you all.”

With that, any fear or doubts disappeared from the faces of the ponies, and they all broke out in a chorus of questions for the little blue engine. Thomas found himself overwhelmed, and it was only thanks to a senior-looking pony calling for attention that everyone calmed down.

“That’s the mayor of Ponyville,” Twilight explained to Thomas in a whisper. “She’s pretty good at rallying everypony’s attention.”

“Now then,” said the Mayor, “I know we’re all excited about our… guest here, but that doesn’t mean we should lose our heads over it. Now, why doesn’t everypony make a nice orderly line so you can each have a turn at asking Thomas your questions?”

The ponies all lined up neatly in front of Thomas’ bufferbeam, and began asking him questions about him one by one, to which he gladly answered to the best extent that he could. After a while, the group began to disperse as the ponies went to continue their previous activities.

“Hey!” exclaimed Rainbow Dash. “Why don’t we show Thomas around Canterlot? There are rails that run through there, so he should be able to see a decent amount of it.”

“That’s a great idea, Rainbow!” said Twilight. She turned to Thomas. “What do you say, Thomas? Would you like to take a tour of Equestria’s capitol?”

Thomas thought a moment before answering. Then he looked towards the sky and saw that the evening sun was disappearing behind the mountains. It was getting late, and it wasn’t a short journey from the little grotto to Tidmouth Sheds back on Sodor.

“I’m really sorry, girls,” he said, “but I must get back to Sodor. I’m needed to attend to a number of duties, and I can’t bear to be away from my branchline for too long.” The ponies sighed sadly, so Thomas quickly said, “But I’ve had the most wonderful time here today. I’ve experienced things here that I’d never even dreamed of seeing. I’d absolutely love to come back and visit Equestria and all of you again. Maybe one day all of you could come visit me on Sodor!”

“That’d be a wonderful thing to do,” replied Twilight.

“Perhaps you could invite us around holiday times,” put in Rarity. “Even though you’re not ponies, I’m sure that I could come up with special decorations and designs for you and your engine friends.”

“Maybe you and I could have a race around the Island,” suggested Rainbow Dash.

“I’d like to see how the farms are run in your world,” said Applejack. “Should be an interestin’ experience.”

“Maybe I could see about making friends with the animals in the forests,” said Fluttershy.

“And maybe I could bring stuff so we could have a party!!” exclaimed Pinkie. Everyone burst out laughing at that. Once they calmed down, Thomas rolled along the line until he found a loop so he could face the buffers. He puffed slowly back to the buffers, while the ponies walked alongside him. They chatted cheerfully until they reached the treeline. They could all see the magic buffers at the end of the line.

Thomas looked at the 6 ponies one last time, and they looked back at him. They gave each other reassuring smiles. “Well,” said Thomas, “thank you everypony, for such a wonderful time today. I do hope that we’ll get to meet up again. Goodbye!!”

And with that, Thomas charged forward towards the buffers at full steam.

“Goodbye Thomas!!” the ponies called in unison. “Come again soon!!”

Just before Thomas passed through the buffers and onto the Magic Railroad, he blew his whistle long and loud in farewell.

         When Thomas finally arrived back home to Tidmouth Sheds, it was very late indeed. The other engines were fast asleep, so he didn’t disturb them as he rolled gently into his berth. His fire burned down into glowing coals, and was then completely extinguished by a workman who happened to be there.

As Thomas began to drift off into sleep, he thought about everything that had occurred during the day. The re-discovery of the Magic Railroad, meeting Lady again, traveling to Equestria and making good friends with Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie, Fluttershy and Rainbow. He knew that he would return some day, and that the ponies would also come to visit Sodor one day as well. Moments before he fell asleep, he heard a whistle blowing in the distance, and he recognized it instantly as Lady’s.

“Good night, Lady,” he murmured, “and good night everypony.” And at last, he fell into a peaceful sleep.

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