Rusty and the Boulder(Alternate Episode)

I loved Thomas and Friends when I was a kid, and I still love it to this day. I still love it even after what happened recently.

One day after school, me and my dad drove to Goodwill to see if there were any good DVD's, VHS tapes, or video games. I was looking around the VHS's when something caught my eye. It was a VHS for Spills and Chills and Other Thomas Thrills. I took the tape out of the sleeve to see if it was in good condition. It was. However, there was scotch tape connected to one side of the tape. It said "Plus Rusty and the Boulder". I thought this was normal since Rusty and the Boulder was an episode in this tape. Me and my dad got this tape, along with tapes of Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast.

When I got home, I went downstairs, turned on VCR/DVD combo, put the Spills and Chills tape in, and pressed play. When the tape started, the credits were rolling, so I rewound the tape back to the beginning. Everything played like normal. The intro, all six episodes, the song, and the credits. All normal.

After the credits were finished rolling, I went to over to the VCR/DVD combo to eject the tape. However, just as I was about to press the eject button, the Britt Allcroft logo was shown again, and the intro played again, as well.

"That's weird." I thought. "I thought this tape ended after the credits."

I sat back and kept watching because I wanted to see what would happen next. The intro played like normal, except when Thomas went under the bridge, instead of saying Spills and Chills over the bridge, it said Rusty and the Boulder.

"That must be why it said "Plus Rusty and the Boulder" on the back. Because it's shown twice." I thought.

The episode then started. Alec Baldwin's normal US narration was heard in the episode.

The episode started the same way it normally does. A quarry was being being built below where the boulder was, with Rusty meeting Thomas and Percy there. Percy asks where the rocks came from. Rusty told him they were from the new quarry, and that it was dangerous. Thomas asked why it was dangerous. Rusty tells the two of them how he feels that the boulder up above is strange and that he feels like it's watching him, with Percy doubting him, saying that boulders don't have eyes. The episode was completely normal so far.

Just then, Edward came by and introduced Thumper(yet another character made only for merchandising). He told them that Thumper would help collect the rock faster. The episode went on like normal, with Thumper collecting rocks and the workmen refusing to check the boulder. After the workmen left, it rained, and Rusty was left at the quarry, scared by the fact that the boulder was above him. A rock falls in front of Rusty, alerting the driver to go to the weather's bedder. As he and Rusty go, the boulder's face was shown up close. The episode was still completely normal.

It cut to the next day. Thumper was working again. Meanwhile, Rusty noticed that the boulder was moving. It fell right in front of Rusty and started moving towards him, causing him to move back. Rusty kept moving back until he reached a siding. His driver decided to stay there until the boulder passes by. It was nowhere in sight. This is where the alteration begins. Instead of Rusty's driver noticing that the boulder was behind him, he doesn't. Instead, the boulder crashes into Rusty, causing Rusty to smash to pieces.

"Oh no!" Rusty screamed, still alive.

Rusty's driver was also alive. He jumped out of Rusty's cab when he wasn't too high above ground, which the narrator said, showing a picture of the driver after he jumped out.

The boulder was moving along the same path from the normal episode. The boulder then found Skarloey in the same path as the original episode. This time, when Skarloey went into the siding, the boulder went into the siding following Skarloey, instead of the other path. The boulder squishes Skarloey, making a lot of his parts break apart, and causing the boulder to bounce to the path it was in the original version.

"We must warn the yard!" Skarloey's driver shouted, just like in the original.

Rusty didn't come by this time, as he was in pieces.

Now it was Rheneas' turn. The boulder went around a bend, just like the original, and followed Rheneas, who puffed backwards at the sight of the boulder coming towards him, screaming, "It's running loose! " and telling his driver to hurry. Then, just like Skarloey, when Rheneas went into the siding, the boulder followed his path. The boulder squished Rheneas, this time looking worse than Skarloey but not as bad as Rusty. All three were still alive, though.

Then the boulder reached the place where Percy was in the original version. This time, Percy was resting in the shed next to him from the original. The shed was open. Then, he heard the boulder, waking him up.

"Oh no, it's heading straight for me!" Percy says, just like in the original.

The boulder crashes into the shed, making it explode.

It then cuts to later. Sir Topham Hatt arrived at the site where the shed exploded. Percy was still completely intact, but covered in ashes.

"What happened here?" Sir Topham Hatt asked Percy.

"It was horrible, sir." Percy replied. "The boulder came toward me and destroyed this shed."

"A boulder destroying all our property?" Sir Topham Hatt said. "We can't have that. We'll leave this part of the island alone from now on."

It then cut to night. The narrator was speaking.

"That night, Sir Topham Hatt moved the boulder to a hill close by the yard. All the engines had been repaired, but the boulder was out for revenge."

The boulder then made a smile.

"I will get those engines one day." The boulder spoke for the first time. "I will permanently destroy every. Single. One.

There was a pause. The boulder started laughing with the Bowser laugh from Hotel Mario. The tape then ejected by itself without any credits.

I was shocked at what I saw. What were they smoking when they were making this.

I contacted Britt Allcroft to see if she knew about this episode. Here's what she responded.

"Dear (withheld name),

We are surprised you came across this tape. You see, season 5 was the first season where the series could do whatever it wants, and the writers were getting a bit crazy with what they were planning. Boulder was supposed to be a new villain to the series, wanting to kill every engine, but that got scrapped officially due to the scary concept. A few engines(and their drivers) were planned to be killed off, but that idea was scrapped before we even started filming the episode. We had to make a lot of cuts to make it more kid-friendly, but even in the first take it wasn't kid friendly enough. It was in the second take before the version everyone knows today. We are sorry in advance for letting this episode get leaked out.

Yours truly, Britt Allcroft

Okay. I guess that made sense. There was one episode in this season where an engine almost fell down a waterfall, and one where an engine almost gets scrapped. So it makes sense that they would be sadistic early on. The question is, though, what was planned for the rest of this season?