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"Have you seen Rip?"
Skipper shrugged, already half asleep as his old man meds kicked in. "Heckiff I know."
Dusty sighed, his wings slumping over his frame as he blew through his mouth. The one time he was actually looking for him, the Mustang was nowhere to be found.
He rolled back to his own hangar, hoping he would be sleeping in there. He tended to when he was lazy. Which...was pretty much always. It was foolproof, he had to be there. It’s not like he had anywhere else he enjoyed being.
He nosed open the doors to his residence, admiring the tacky Halloween decorations he’d hung up on them, and peered inside. No Ripslinger.
“Dang it!” He mumbled, “Where could he be?”
He rolled in the rest of the way, flicking on the lights and settling in front of the window, with those little sticky window things of a ghost and a spider. Though he was an avid horror fan - at least, after Chug dragged him into it - he still liked to keep things family friendly. “It’s for the kids” he would always say. “What kids?” Skipper would always retaliate.
As he sat back on his wheels admiring the night sky, the radio flickered beside him. Someone calling, at this hour? He rolled a wheel over the receiver,
“Hello?”
“Hello,” came a smooth, masculine voice. He didn’t recognize it.
“Who is this?” Dusty asked, a little skeptical.
“I don’t know, who is this?”
Dusty rolled his eyes, seeing through the façade, “I’m pretty sure you know.”
“Oh do I?”
“Obviously, or else you wouldn’t know how to contact me.”
"Hmm...you're the famous Dusty Crophopper." The stranger admitted.
"This is he," Dusty answered, "but you still didn't answer my question; who are you?"
"A fan of yours," came the strangers reply, slinking around an exact name, "with a question...Do you like scary movies?"
Something cold prickled against Dusty's back, and his wing flaps seemed to stiffen. His eyebrows furrowed a little as he hesitated to continue.
"Yeah, I do. Why?"
"What's your favorite scary movie?"
Dusty glanced behind him at the door. The room was too dimly lit for his liking suddenly, and he moved to the side to get the light.
No power.
"Uhh...can I answer in full in my next Q and A?" He asked, anxious to get off the call and out of the building. There's a short pause and the fleck of static from the other end, before the stranger softly rasped,
"What's wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost."
Dusty tensed on the spot. Could he see him from here!?
"I-I need to go!" Dusty said, rolling over the plate again and closing their conversation. Just as he was nudging the doors open again to slip out into the light of the street lamps, something big and heavy launched itself at him.
"AAAHH!"
Dusty tried to scramble away, but he was pinned under the being. He would have turned around enough to get a good hard bite in him, had he not caught the sound of uncontrollable laughing above him. Snorting, even. And then he realized who was sitting on top of him.
"RIP! THAT'S NOT FUNNY!"
Ripslinger slid back off of him, breaking into a fit of giggles. But he tried to make his response sound like the guy over the phone, despite his mad chuckling.
"Is it- is it..is it Scream, by chance? Is that your favorite SCARY movie?"
"You know I don't like being spooked!" Dusty huffed. Ripslinger shook his head like it would help him stop laughing.
"Nah man, you don't like it because you're so easy to get. You fall for it every time!"
Dusty puffed his cheeks into bubbles, trying to hide the pink sheen on them. "Just for that, I'm not sharing my Halloween candy with you!"
"Okay okay, that's fair," Ripslinger said, having finally calmed himself down, "man, that was so worth it..."
He'll do it again...