The Christmas season of 2014 is one that the citizens of Sodor will never forget.
On the evening of December 23, a prison break took place at Ballahoo Penitentiary. The bank robbery and criminal mastermind William Tockman (known to the public as Clock King) was freed by an explosives expert named Mark Scheffer, aka Shrapnel. What was presented to the public as the rampage of two master criminals was actually a scheme concocted by the American government agency ARGUS, who employed both Tockman and Scheffer. The order to enact the prison break was given by the agency's director Amanda Waller, but it couldn't have happened without the aid of the Sudrian military general Malus Foris, who hacked into the servers of the private security company HAWK and disabled the penitentiary's defense systems.
The next day, Foris ordered Tockman and Scheffer to continue their campaign of causing confusion and delay on the North Western Railway, with the general intention of causing Sir Topham Hatt to look bad to the public (This was part of a long-standing scheme to eventually depose Hatt, but we'll get into that some other time.) Tockman and Scheffer got a little too creative with their orders, and decided to cause mass hysteria by planting a bomb on a freight train being hauled by the narrow gauge engine Duncan. This, in combination with Duncan's rough riding on the rails, resulted in the bomb detonating atop Maron Viaduct. Duncan and his crew were able to escape safely, but the viaduct collapsed, resulting in another scandal for the railway.
Although this did technically accomplish Foris' order of causing chaos for the railway, his superiors weren't happy with the very public and obvious sabotage that the agents had committed. Another one of Waller's agents scolded Scheffer and Tockman when they requested to be extracted from the island, and this interaction was secretly monitored by HAWK and its leader Sir Daniel Moriarty. Moriarty decided to recruit the two agents for his own causes, but his plotting was interrupted by the discovery that HAWK had been hacked. The investigation into HAWK's hacking would eventually lead to great chaos and tragedy for the Island of Sodor, but again, we'll get to that some other time.
As for Duncan, the poor engine really hadn't been at fault for the destruction of the viaduct, but his poor attitude resulted in him being shut up in the shed in the late hours of Christmas Eve. He would eventually be let out by Sir Topham Hatt on New Year's Eve, with his time in the sheds providing him with a slightly more positive outlook on life. Duncan would go on to become a much more cooperative and helpful member of the Skarloey Railway, although his sassy demeanor would never truly go away.
The destruction of the viaduct was cited by the Railway Board as yet another example of the chaos that Sir Topham Hatt was allowing to happen on his railway, and they began to make plans to replace him as the controller of the North Western Railway. Unfortunately for them, they would never get to act on these plans, as the machinations of Sir Daniel Moriarty and his benefactor, the mysterious Peter Sam, would soon throw the entire Island of Sodor into utter chaos. #SudrianTales
MrMPS2002
SUDRIAN TALES LORE POST:
The Christmas season of 2014 is one that the citizens of Sodor will never forget.
On the evening of December 23, a prison break took place at Ballahoo Penitentiary. The bank robbery and criminal mastermind William Tockman (known to the public as Clock King) was freed by an explosives expert named Mark Scheffer, aka Shrapnel. What was presented to the public as the rampage of two master criminals was actually a scheme concocted by the American government agency ARGUS, who employed both Tockman and Scheffer. The order to enact the prison break was given by the agency's director Amanda Waller, but it couldn't have happened without the aid of the Sudrian military general Malus Foris, who hacked into the servers of the private security company HAWK and disabled the penitentiary's defense systems.
The next day, Foris ordered Tockman and Scheffer to continue their campaign of causing confusion and delay on the North Western Railway, with the general intention of causing Sir Topham Hatt to look bad to the public (This was part of a long-standing scheme to eventually depose Hatt, but we'll get into that some other time.) Tockman and Scheffer got a little too creative with their orders, and decided to cause mass hysteria by planting a bomb on a freight train being hauled by the narrow gauge engine Duncan. This, in combination with Duncan's rough riding on the rails, resulted in the bomb detonating atop Maron Viaduct. Duncan and his crew were able to escape safely, but the viaduct collapsed, resulting in another scandal for the railway.
Although this did technically accomplish Foris' order of causing chaos for the railway, his superiors weren't happy with the very public and obvious sabotage that the agents had committed. Another one of Waller's agents scolded Scheffer and Tockman when they requested to be extracted from the island, and this interaction was secretly monitored by HAWK and its leader Sir Daniel Moriarty. Moriarty decided to recruit the two agents for his own causes, but his plotting was interrupted by the discovery that HAWK had been hacked. The investigation into HAWK's hacking would eventually lead to great chaos and tragedy for the Island of Sodor, but again, we'll get to that some other time.
As for Duncan, the poor engine really hadn't been at fault for the destruction of the viaduct, but his poor attitude resulted in him being shut up in the shed in the late hours of Christmas Eve. He would eventually be let out by Sir Topham Hatt on New Year's Eve, with his time in the sheds providing him with a slightly more positive outlook on life. Duncan would go on to become a much more cooperative and helpful member of the Skarloey Railway, although his sassy demeanor would never truly go away.
The destruction of the viaduct was cited by the Railway Board as yet another example of the chaos that Sir Topham Hatt was allowing to happen on his railway, and they began to make plans to replace him as the controller of the North Western Railway. Unfortunately for them, they would never get to act on these plans, as the machinations of Sir Daniel Moriarty and his benefactor, the mysterious Peter Sam, would soon throw the entire Island of Sodor into utter chaos. #SudrianTales
1 year ago | [YT] | 28