Ghostbusters (14 page)

“Oh, these are the blueprints of the structural ironwork in Dana Barrett’s apartment building . . . and they’re most unusual.”

Winston nodded. “Are you a Christian, Ray.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Me too,” Winston said. It made him feel better, seeing as how he was driving an ambulance full of little metal coffins—coffins full of spooks, specters, wraiths, geists, and ghosts.

Stantz rattled the blueprints and brought a section close to his eye. “Boy! Solid cores of shielded selenium three twenty-five.”

“Do you believe in God?” Winston asked, continuing to disjoint the conversation.

“No. But I liked Jesus’ style.”

“Me too. Parts of the Bible are great.”

“The whole roofcap was fabricated with a magnesium-tungsten alloy.”

A car full of waving teenagers pulled around them. Neither noticed.

“Ray, do you remember something in the Bible about a day when the dead would rise up from their graves?”

“And the seas would boil . . .”

“Right,” Winston said excitedly. “And the sky would fall . . .”

“Judgment Day.”

“Yeah, Judgment Day.”

They sat quietly for a moment, each alone with his thoughts. Stantz took a long pull on his beer, then passed it to Zeddemore.

“Every ancient religion had its own myth about the end of the world,” he said softly.

“Well, has it occurred to you that the reason that we’ve been so busy lately is that the dead have been rising from their graves?”

“There’s a thought.”

Dana Barrett still floated above the bed while Peter Venkman rummaged through the drawers of her dresser. She’s an artist, he thought. She’s got to have some Valium somewhere.

Egon Spengler checked the needle on the big PKE gauge, the one connected to the fixed plasmatometer on top of their roof antennae. It had pegged again. He switched it to a higher scale, watched the needle drop back, and noted the new reading on his clipboard. Up 4.7 percent in the last hour alone. Something had to break soon.

Ecto-One pulled up to the great timber and stone gatehouse of Fort Detmerring. A single light burned over a placard announcing the times of tours, and opening and closing hours. Silently, Stantz and Zeddemore helped each other into their proton packs. As they finished, two figures loomed up out of the darkness, wearing dark jackets and Stetsons. Stantz nodded pleasantly.

“Evening.”

“Evening,” the park ranger replied, taking the clipboard and initialing the forms. He affixed a GSA purchase order and passed it back. “We’ve had quite a problem here for some time. I called your outfit a couple of weeks ago.”

“Busy time of year,” Winston said. He tested the charge on the accelerator. It looked good for one more job.

“Nobody likes to talk about this sort of thing.”

“You don’t have to worry about that with us, sir,” Ray Stantz assured him.

“Yeah,” Zeddemore added. “We’ll believe anything.”

“Egon, the police are here.”

“Picking up or dropping off?”

“Dropping off.”

Spengler wiped his hands on a rag and went upstairs, grateful for any distraction. There were times when he could swear he heard moaning from the containment, which troubled him more than he liked to admit. Janine smiled warmly as he passed by and he favored her with a wink. Venkman had told him that girls liked that. Girls were a new experience to Egon Spengler, something to be studied. And enjoyed, he decided, pleased at himself over this revelation. Janine followed him out to where a police van was idling before the building. A sergeant was waiting at the rear. He offered Spengler his hand.

“Rosenberg, Twenty-fourth Precinct. We picked this guy up and now we don’t know what to do with him. Bellevue doesn’t want him and I’m afraid to put him in the lockup. There’s something too weird about him. He’d cause a riot or they’d kill him. Anyway, I know you guys are into this stuff, so I thought I’d check with you.”

The man in the back—straitjacketed and tied to the bench with leather restraints—still retained a weird dignity, the like of which Egon Spengler had never seen. The little man looked up and asked seriously, “Are you the Gatekeeper?”

Ah. Spengler thought, perhaps the pieces are falling into place. I’ve been waiting for this one.

“Bring him inside, Officer.”

Stantz and Zeddemore had split up at the entrance to the armory and Ray was now prowling along the parapet, swinging his detectors from side to side. Nothing. He detoured around a stack of cannonballs and made for a lighted entrance. The plaque said that this was a fully restored replica of an officer’s room, complete with uniforms, furniture, and accoutrements. Fascinated, Stantz walked in.

The little man had been divested of his restraints and given a Rubik’s Cube to occupy his attention. He was sniffing the various colors, trying to decide which one to eat as Spengler readied the visual imaging tracker. An aluminum collander had been strapped to the man’s head, and thousands of wires connected it through the archetype transliterator to a 19-inch color TV. Janine was watching, fascinated, as the image appeared there in flickering colors. It was not the head of a man, but that of a large, doglike creature. Jeez, what a creep, Janine decided.

“Who are you?” Spengler asked.

“I am Vinz Clortho—Keymaster of Gozer,” the man replied. Spengler sat bolt upright in his seat. Yes, this was the missing piece.

“And I am Egon Spengler, creature of Earth, doctor of physics, graduate of M.I.T.”

Janine was going through the little man’s wallet. “According to this his name is Louis Tully. And his address, it looks real familiar.”

“Oh, no,” Vinz said firmly. “Tully is the fleshbag I’m using. I must wait inside for the sign.”

“Do you want some coffee while you’re waiting?”

“Do I?”

“Yes, have some.”

“Yes,” Tully replied. “Have some.” Janine hurried to put some water on to boil. Louis Tully was making her extremely nervous. Spengler, satisfied that his recorders and monitors were working correctly, smiled at Tully. Tully returned the smile, and took a large bite out of the Rubik’s Cube, scattering the colored pieces. Spengler gently removed the remains from his hand and gave him a bowl of popcorn. “Vinz, what sign are you waiting for?”

“Gozer the Traveler will come in one of the pre chosen forms,” he replied excitedly. “During the Rectification of the Vuldronaii, the Traveler came as a very large and moving Torb. Then, of course, in the Third Reconciliation of the Last of the Meketrex Supplicants, they chose a new form for him, that of a Sloar. Many Shubbs and Zulls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the Sloar that day, I can fell you.”

Spengler stared at Tully, then looked at Janine, who made the traditional finger-circle motion for loony. The phone rang suddenly, startling them all. Spengler and Janine each made a dive for it, bumping heads. He let her take it but she handed it to him and smiled nervously. Tully gave off a raucous cackle, then went back to figuring out how to remove the popcorn from the bowl by passing the pieces directly through the glass, as Spengler raised the phone to his ear.

“Hello?”

“It’s Peter, Egon. I’ve got a problem.”

He’s got a problem. “What is it?”

“I’m with Dana Barrett and she’s floating three feet off the bed.”

“Does she want to be?”

“I don’t think so,” Venkman replied haltingly. He sounded tired. “It’s more of the Gozer thing. She says she’s the Gatekeeper. Does that make any sense to you?”

“Some,” Spengler said slowly, preoccupied with Louis Tully. The little man had given up on the bowl and was trying to scratch his ear with one foot. “I just met the Keymaster, Peter. He’s here with me now.”

There was a long silence. “Peter, are you there?”

“Yeah, yeah. I was just thinking. It probably wouldn’t be a good idea for them to get together at this point.”

“I agree.”

“You have to keep him there, Egon. Do whatever you have to do, but don’t let him leave. He could be very dangerous.”

Spengler looked nervously at Tully. He had discovered the coffee. He poured a handful of coffee crystals into his mouth and chewed them up, then picked the pot of boiling water from the Bunsen burner. He sniffed it and took a long drink. It didn’t seem to bother him.

“Egon?”

“All right, I’ll try.”

“I’ll spend the night here and get back first thing in the morning.”

“All right, Peter. Good night.”

He hung up the phone and glanced at Tully, who had fallen asleep on the couch with his arms and legs in the air. Janine moved over and huddled protectively against Spengler.

“Egon, there’s something very strange about that man. I’m very psychic usually, and right now I have this terrible feeling that something awful is going to happen to you.” She sniffed. “I’m afraid you’re going to die.”

Spengler blinked at her. “Die in what sense?”

“In the physical sense.”

Spengler had thought a lot about death since they had started Ghostbusters, but always in abstract terms. Death was not something that would happen to him, at least not in the sense that it happened to anyone else. Other people died. Quietly or messily, they snuffed out. But he would discorporate, transmogrify directly to another plane, go on in the vast cosmic continuum as a spark of energy. The body wasn’t very important when you compared it to the mind, and Egon Spengler had a very large, though somewhat disordered mind. But Venkman had been teaching him about girls and he did vaguely understand Janine’s need. She was afraid. Comfort her.

“I don’t care,” he said at last. “I see us as tiny parts of a vast organism, like two bacteria living on a rotting speck of dust, floating in an infinite void.”

Janine sighed. “That’s so romantic.”

She put her arms around Spengler and held him tightly, an experience with which the scientist was totally unfamiliar. A mating ritual, he realized. Respond. He put his hands awkwardly on her back. “You have nice clavicles,” he stuttered.

“You’re sweet, Egon.”

I wonder where Stantz is, he thought. We’re going to need him.

Stantz had discovered a treasure trove. Having stripped off his pack and coverall, he was trying on a Revolutionary War officer’s uniform, complete with sabre and tricornered hat. He appraised himself in the full-length mirror. Not bad. Captain Stantz reporting, General Washington. The men are ready and awaiting your orders. I would have done well back then, he thought.

He removed the saber and hung it from the doorknob, then tested the bed with his hand. Amazingly soft, probably filled with down, and pillows stuffed with feathers. Not shredded foam and kapok. God, I was born in the wrong century. He stretched out on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. Those were exciting times.

He fell asleep almost immediately, dreaming of Valley Forge, of Yorktown and Bunker Hill, leaving New York and ghosts far behind. Consequently, he didn’t see the light on his PKE meter come on.

A moment later the saber began to move ever so slightly in its sheath, then the sheath itself began tapping rhythmically on the wall as a glowing light slowly seeped in through the cracks in the door. It formed into a pink cloud, then rose gently toward the ceiling, seemingly fascinated with the sleeping man, Stantz tossed in his dreams and rolled over on his back. The mist began to descend.

Stantz awoke to find himself face to face with the ghostly apparition they had come to remove, his body paralyzed with fear. And yet, she was beautiful. It seemed impossible that anything so beautiful would harm him. Then why am I so terrified?

The apparition smiled and drifted slowly toward the end of the bed. If I hold still, Stantz thought, it’ll go away and I can follow it. I was a fool to let down my guard. That won’t happen again. He opened his eyes. The phantom woman had vanished. Well, that’s the end of that, he decided, and started to rise . . .

His belt suddenly came undone.

The buttons on his pants began to open one by one.

He felt an electric sensation between his legs.

You know, he thought, maybe we’ve been going about this all wrong. Maybe some of these spirits are friendly . . .

Beneficial . . .

Fantastic . . .

He closed his eyes. I don’t think we’re going to find this one, he thought.

Winston had come up empty. If there was a ghost at Fort Detmerring, it was a real quiet one. I wonder how Ray’s doing. He came around the end of a corridor and suddenly heard voices from behind a wooden door. And light inside, through the cracks. Ray?

“Hey, Stantz. You okay in there?”

“Later, man!”

Zeddemore shrugged. He’s the boss. He must know what he’s doing. He ambled off in search of a cigarette.

Back in the apartment, Peter Venkman had at last fallen into a troubled sleep. And by his side, drugged, possessed, and three feet in the air, Dana Barrett slumbered on.

I hate all bungling like sin. but most of all bungling in state affairs, which produces nothing but mischief to thousands and millions.

—Goethe

Walter Peck was feeling the self-satisfaction of a man who was about to get revenge on an enemy, and he wasn’t entirely sure that he liked it. Revenge wasn’t the point, he told himself. I’m a public servant, looking out for the public good. What I do I do out of responsibility, duty, and the law. I don’t do it because I like it; I do it because it has to be done. Having told himself all of these things, he at last permitted himself a thin, sneering smile.

Duty or not, I am really going to enjoy sticking it to Peter Venkman.

The little convoy turned onto Mott Street and rolled up to the firehouse with its garish neon sign. A county sheriff’s car blocked the garage opening. A New York City police car and a Con Edison van pulled up in the alley alongside. And Peck, in a burst of missionary zeal, parked his lime green United States government interagency motor pool sedan in front of a fire plug and stepped out. The others were waiting for him.

“Don’t take any guff off these people, gentlemen,” Peck announced. “They’re a bunch of con men, so be on your toes.”

“Can we get on with this?” Bennett, the NYPD captain, asked impatiently. He’d worked with Peck before and didn’t like him.