My eyes scanned the wooded earth as I looked for the desolate airstrip I had been reassigned to. "Piston Peak Tower, this is Tanker Three. I'm not familiar with the area. Can I get some directions?" There was some static and then a response that was too mixed up in the static for me to understand. "Damn old radio." I looked down to see a road with shiny cars driving into the park. "But then again, I'm a damned old plane." Up ahead I saw a gigantic wooden lodge that I recognized from the picture I had been shown before takeoff. Banking right I began scanning the ground and hills for the Piston Peak Airstrip. Finally I saw a concrete runway with a few older looking hangars lined up next to it. Lowering my flaps and landing gear, I slowed down and turned to face the end of the runway. I dropped altitude and pulled my nose up just before touch down with the runway. My main wheels let out a small squeal and I quickly began slowing down. I turned off the runway and shut down my engines as I looked around the seemingly abandoned airstrip. "Hello? Anybody here?" I called out as I rolled across the ramp in front of the hangars.
"Heh, an old B-25. Haven't seen one of you guys in years." A voice said and I turned to look towards the owner of the voice.
"Who the hell you callin' old?" I asked the grey forklift who I noticed had a tooth missing.
"You. You must be what; sixty something?" He asked as he drove around me, looking me over.
"Seventy next month. What's it to ya?"
"You must be the new guy Blade was talking about." A feminine voice said and I turned again to find the speaker. "Hi, I'm Dipper." A yellow floatplane said with a smile.
"I'm Robert but everybody just calls me Bobby." I replied as I looked slightly down at her. "Super Scooper. I used to work with one of you. Nice guy too. Till he went splat on that hillside." I said as I rolled away from them towards what I assumed to be the crew leader's hangar. Making my way up the slope to the hangar I saw the doors were open to let in the breeze that danced through the hills. "Hello? I'm looking for Blade Ranger."
A red and white helicopter rolled up to the doors and looked at me with blue eyes. "You must be Robert. You've got hangar five." Blade said before rolling back into the hangar. I rolled down the hill and found hangar five across the runway from the control tower. Rolling inside I saw the walls were bare except for a few spots of rust. Giving a small grunt of approval I set about getting my personal stuff unloaded. Opening the small hatch in my tail I gently lowered my tail and felt the items that had been stowed away slide out onto the concrete floor. I jerked my tail up and felt the hatch slam shut. Turning around I looked at everything I owned that now sat on the floor of the hangar. With a sigh I gently slid the old record player over by the wall and repeated the process for the stack of records that had been tied up by one of the forklifts back at my old airfield. As I rolled back over to the small stack of items, I heard a crunch under my front wheel. I rolled back and looked down at what I'd run over. Where my front wheel had been sat a now broken picture frame. Looking at the picture inside, I gave a small growl and rolled forward to kick the frame out the hangar with my left main wheel. The picture flew out the hangar and hit something with a metallic clang.
"Ow! What was that?!" Someone asked and I glanced sideways out the doors at the plane who sat outside. He looked down at the frame that had landed on his pontoon and then in at me. "Is this you in this picture?" He asked me as he rolled into the hangar.
"Yeah. What about it?" I asked while I moved a photo album over to a shelf.
"It's just that the other guy in here is Thunderbird." The orange floatplane replied as he began to approach me.
"Yeah. We were buddies up until '76. Now I check the news hoping to see he finally kicked the bucket. Do me a favor and toss that picture in the trash on your way out." I told him as I rolled over to where the pile had been. "Say, ain't you that racer kid I saw on the TV last year?"
I asked with another glance at him. "Yeah. I'm Dusty Crophopper. And you are?"
"No one of importance. Not now, not ever. Now please get the hell out of my hangar." I said as I untied my records. He rolled over to the doors and I made sure to shut them as soon as I was certain I wouldn't hit him. Quietly I rolled over to the records and slowly sifted through them to find one I wanted to listen to. Finally I found one and gently picked it up with a set of grippers I'd been given. Setting the record on the player I dropped the needle onto the edge of the record and turned on the player. A moment later and That Lucky Old Sun filled the hangar.
Elsewhere on the field though, others were conversing about me. "He seemed really rude to me." Dipper said as her, Dusty, and a couple others sat on the tarmac with cans of oil in front of them.
"Sometimes old planes like him can be like that. Skipper was pretty grumpy the first time I tried to talk to him. You've just got to let him warm up to you." Dusty replied before taking a sip of oil. "Besides, sometimes planes like him have seen things that make them a bit antisocial." He said as he finished his drink.
"What is he again?" Cabbie asked.
"B-25." Dusty said as he pushed aside his empty oil can.
"I heard those guys saw some bad things during the war. I don't blame him if he's quiet." Cabbie replied as he looked up at the sky.
"Plus it seems like he's had a falling out with a friend of his." Dusty told them as he set the picture in front of them all for them to see.
"It that Thunderbird?" Dipper asked with excitement as she looked at the red, white, and blue P-51 in the photograph.
"Yeah. He said they were friends until the 70s." Dusty replied as he looked over at Dipper and then back to the picture. As they all looked at the picture the PA system came to life.
"All aircraft, report of a fire in Augerin Canyon." They all immediately started their engines and rolled to their positions on the runway.
Meanwhile I rolled over to the hangar doors and looked out at the other planes through a small crack between the doors. Grunting in annoyance at the noise I rolled backwards and looked over at the record player which had stopped playing several minutes ago. Putting the needle back on the record I sat there and let the music take me away to a happier time.