thinkin about making an autistic thomas the tank engine original character, because i'm autistic, and also because i'm autistic.

he was called lazy on the mainland until one of his crew learned to accommodate his quirks. For example he just wouldn't steam up in the morning if he had to go to the passenger station. passengers are too loud. he doesn't like to go there.

he has burst his safety valve in the station on a few occasions when he had to pull passenger trains through big stations. too many loud noise and it gets so overwhelming that he just can't deal with it. but his driver helped him learn coping mechanisms, and gave him earplugs.

(His driver refuses to disclose where engine ears are.) He used to hate pulling freight trains until the trucks realized that he's weird but actually really nice and gentle. He hates bumping trucks just as much as they hate to be bumped.

He's had a few special interests over the years. At one point he got obsessed with a radio show, and one of his coping mechanisms became humming the theme tune. He got obsessed with trees, for a while.

He then became obsessed with gardening and had his driver read everything about plants and flowers he could find at the library. "If you take this passenger train, I'll let you tell the passengers about the history of tomatoes."

If he did a really good job, driver would buy a plant for the garden just outside the shed, and he'd buy plants on the engine's birthday and for christmas. He wished he could tend to the garden himself, but he still felt proud of it.

The garden was tended to as a hobby by some of the railway workers--and you can be that if he was there, the engine would be telling them how to do it!

the trucks actually like hearing about gardening, not because they're interested in it, but because engines usually don't talk to them unless they're being rude and it's a nice change.

Once, he was given a fresh coat of paint, which he always HATED (there was a time when he would flat out not move if you told him you were taking him to the works to get repainted, but he merely tolerates it now), and they had some local children come and paint him in flowers.

He ran like that for a couple years on a branch line, and he felt really confident and happy since everyone loved to see him come and go.

Towards the end of steam, his driver had retired, but he still came to visit, and he had trained his successor in how to properly treat the engine. When he heard that the engine was to be withdrawn from service, he was heartbroken, and he called the Fat Controller.

i will spare you the details of what happened when he heard he was being withdrawn, because even imagining a vaguely realistic emotional reaction to that is making me want to cry.

"The managers think he's lazy, but he's really a hard worker if you treat him right," he said, "he just has special needs." The Fat Controller knew all about engines who had special needs.

He now works as a spare engine on NWR branch lines, and he likes working with Edward & BoCo best. Thomas is quite rude to him because he doesn't understand his ways (and couldn't care less about gardening!), and well, Duck & Oliver have a great western way of doing things.

And he now runs in NWR blue with white stripes and is painted in a professional mural of flowers on his side. The Fat Controller hired a counselor for the engine, and his old driver comes and visits occasionally.