Chapter 25
*** I did not have sexual relations with that helicopter! ***

Trainwreck soared through Brockton Bay's night sky, making his way towards the place mentioned in the message. Activating his electronic optical scanners, better known as the zoom function on his phone, he looked at the building.

Placed in the rich part of town, it looked like a haunted house. It was old, half-destroyed, and surrounded by tall grass and a large overgrown fence. It was the type of place where normal people would dare each other to spend a night, and then run away from once the guy with the chainsaw came out.

Sadly, most haunted houses did not have a helicopter hangar, so he would never know what that would actually feel like.

Trainwreck was what the PRT called a case 53. According to the PRT, he was a human that had lost his memories and had his body transformed when he had gotten powers, but he knew that was incorrect.

The problem with the PRT, and scientists studying parahumans in general, was the human part of the descriptor parahuman. For some reason, they assumed that only humans could be sentient and sapient, and that only humans could get powers, and that therefore only humans could be case 53's.

Trainwreck knew better than that. He knew, deep down, that in his previous life, the life he had lived before his memories had been taken and his body had mutated, he had been a Bell UH-1 Iroquois, serving in the Vietnam War.

Sometimes, people made fun of him for that. He could understand it. Nam had not been a popular war, and most Americans that had lived through it tried to forget it. To then be confronted with a forgotten weapon of war, thrown away and left to rot in a depot until it got powers… It was only logical that they disliked him.

Worse were the people who denied him, denied the idea that he had flown over the jungles of Vietnam, raining down fire and explosions on the communist insurgents, fighting for the country he had been built in. "But Trainwreck," they said, "You look far too young to have been in Nam, and how could you possible remember it when you lost all of your memories?"

It was a foolish endeaveor. After all, if he wasn't really an attack helicopter, deep down inside, then why did watching footage and movies from that period feel so right? How come he liked Wagner so much? How come he was fascinated by fire if it wasn't because he used to have flamethrowers? The trees and houses beneath him were nice, sure, but they were nothing compared to burning huts and running natives.

Luckily, not everyone was as ignorant as director Piggot and her Heliuscopterusphobic minions. Was that a word? Probably not, but the bigots at the dictionary publisher refused to create a word for them, no matter how many letters they got. On the internet however, people did accept him for who he knew himself to be, and he got the support he needed. He hadn't even had to steal too many parts to build himself his new body, as he got donations from his . Sure, he didn't actually do anything for them, but he was famous so everyone gave him money anyway.

The real problem on the internet were the fakers, the people that pretended to be like him, and wanted to steal attention away from him. Sure, he was a Case 53 helicopter in a semi-human steampowered helicopter body, but that made sense. Things like that happened all the time. But some of these idiots on the internet claimed to have the soul of a dog, or a unicorn, without having any of the powers or memory loss that came with being a Case 53! Even worse, some of thought they had been characters from a popular videogame in a previous life, from a different dimension where that videogame was real. It was absolutely ridiculous! Couldn't those idiots understand that telling a helicopter that you understood his suffering because you're a middle-schooler pretending to be a cartoon dog was really insensitive?

Trainwreck reached his destination, and floated above his target, the tall grass surrounding the manor house pointing away from him. He couldn't see any place to land, even though the invitation had said that they understood his plight.

Then, he saw a creaky old door open, and someone flicked out a small canister. He flew up and away from the canister, and it exploded into an orange liquid that quickly ate away at the tall grass, leaving a perfectly round, deforested patch on the ground.

Agent Orange, he immediately knew. Sure, in all the movies it was translucent or white-ish, but he knew better, he'd been in Nam, and this orange liquid could only be the real Agent Orange. It called to him, and he wanted it, wanted missile launchers filled with the stuff. Both to fight the communist insurgents, and to get rid of that tree outside his workshop that held all those fucking birds.

As soon as the Agent Orange had faded away (it staying in the environment for a long time was a liberal communist lie!), a white helicopter platform started growing in its place, made out of bonelike material.

So his guess had been correct, it was the Marquis that had invited him.

As he touched down on the ground, he deactivated his external rotors, and changed himself into a smaller, more mobile form. He was, in many ways, a transformer. Only instead of a robot hiding like a car, he was a helicopter that could become sort of robot-person-like when he wanted to.

In the darkness, he could see three people waiting for him. One, he recognized from the newspaper. Another, he also recognized from the newspaper. The third, he didn't recognize from the newspaper. Not because she was a girl, mind you, but because she was a lot less famous. Also, helicopters didn't have genders, so he couldn't actually be sexist. Even though sometimes he got all hot and bothered when looking at Dragon's stuff on the internet.

"Marquis? You're working with Lung?" Trainwreck asked.

"To be specific, Lung is working for me, as my lieutenant in charge of the Asian part of the city. A role very similar to the one I would have you fulfil, if you take me up on my offer," Marquis said, his voice smooth and bony. Or maybe that was just his reputation? What would a bony voice even sound like? Skeletons couldn't possibly talk except by magic, so there was no reason to assume that their voice wouldn't sound perfectly normal. Or maybe like Donald Duck, squeaky and annoying.

"I'm really more of an independent type. Regardless of how the bigots in city hall see me, I never intended to become a criminal," Trainwreck responded. "To have me join the organisation of someone that has been in the birdcage, and has a reputation for ruthlessly killing his opposition when necessary, well, I'm not sure about it."

Marquis moved closer, close enough to be clearly visible, his face illuminated by the moonlight. Or maybe by a streetlight pointing in the wrong direction, it was hard to tell.

He walked back and forth, pondering the issue for a while before talking.

"I can understand where you're coming from, but you must understand, I'm doing this for your protection. Lustrum will take down everyone that doesn't agree with her," he said.

Trainwreck thought about it, but he wasn't really afraid of Lustrum. After all, Lustrum just wanted to kill all men, and he wasn't a man, he was an attack helicopter. He really didn't want to get caught up in a fight between two birdcage escapees.

Sensing his hesitance, Marquis continued talking.

"Also, Bakuda here will provide you with incendiary missiles whenever you need them, the bette-"

"Okay I'll do it!" Trainwreck shouted. Finally, he would be complete!