THE REAL GHOSTBUSTERS: MYSTERIES OF THE WORM
A Squirm-Inducing Tale by Vyrazhi, ©2015
October, 1987
"There's nothing like an informative trip to the New York Public Library," Egon Spengler enthused as his three fellow Ghostbusters followed behind.
"Yeah, except listening to you talk," said Peter Venkman.
"Come on. Kids are back in school, so what's wrong with brushing up on our studies?" That was Winston Zeddemore, acting as the voice of reason in vocabulary that the others could understand - unlike Egon's.
"Besides, speaking of kids, we might see some that we met on Career Day last week." Ray Stantz, ever the optimist, didn't see the others exchange weary looks. That event had not been a smashing success.
As the four of them stepped into the library, they were glad they'd left their proton packs in the car. Even though they were meant to damage ghosts, humans would definitely suffer if bombarded. Ray was right: Dozens of students bustled around the bookshelves, oblivious to all else.
Let's hope none of them recognize us, thought Peter. One of these little punks actually asked, "Do ghosts have boogers?" His name was Todd. Phfft. I've known quite a few screwed-up people with that name.
The Ghostbusters went toward the Philosophy and Psychology section, specifically the 130's: Paranormal and Occult Phenomena. The array of books was so extensive that Egon and Winston took the front half of one shelf, and Peter and Ray the back half. However, three of them became so absorbed in browsing that they didn't notice the fourth one wander off to a completely different area.
Once Egon, Peter and Winston had made their selections, they filed in line to check out. Children stood in front of and behind them, but Ray was at the end. He said not a word, clutching something that was definitely not a book about ghosts. It was his secret obsession; he hid volumes like these under his pillow.
When it was their turn, the librarian on duty read each of their titles out loud - at least, at library volume:
"The Electronegative Charges of Preternatural Entities," she told Egon. "It's due in two weeks. Next."
"Eldritch Horrors," she said to Winston. "Due in two weeks. Next."
"Phantasms and Poltergeists." She glanced at Peter. "New book, therefore due in one week. Next."
"Hey, where's Ray?" asked Egon, suddenly noticing that he wasn't with them.
"Right here." He cut through the line, making the school-age kids in front of him grumble. "I'd like…this."
The librarian raised an eyebrow. "Walt Fleischmann's Dopey Dog, number fifty-four?"
The others turned to face him with amused stares. "Brushing up on your studies, eh?" said Winston.
"No fair. That's my favorite comic book." They noticed a young boy coming toward them.
"Well, it's mine too, so finders keepers, losers weepers. Wait a minute - aren't you Todd Dexter Ward?"
Oh, no. Peter tugged on Ray's sleeve. "We'd better get back to the firehouse. Duty calls."
"Uh-huh, but how did you know my whole name? Are you those stupid Ghostbusters from Career Day?"
"It was hard to miss when your teacher called it out real loud, and gave you a detention."
"Peter," chided the other three.
Todd ignored them and went up to the librarian. "Mysteries of the Worm," she said. "Due in two weeks."
Once he had his book in hand, he flipped it open to a page with a gargantuan worm on it. "Boo."
"Aah!" Ray jumped back, and Todd laughed.
"You were great practice for trying that out on my sister. See you later, losers!"
Once Todd had departed, Peter said, "I've had enough of this place for one day. How about you guys?"
"Yeah," said Winston. "And that kid, too." Thus satisfied, the Ghostbusters drove back to their base.
Soon afterward Todd, with his literary treasure clutched to his chest, attempted to sneak in the back door of his house. Unfortunately it led to the kitchen, where his mother was slicing up an onion for tonight's meal. While her back was turned, Todd hid the book underneath his shirt and tried to creep past her.
"I'm glad you're back from the library. Did you do your math homework?" Silence. "Well?"
"I'm going to do it right now," he half-lied. He had to check on Annie first.
Without warning, his six-year-old sister Helen barged in and almost collided with him. "Watch it," she said. "You know what rhymes with Todd? 'Odd' and 'clod.' Oh, and 'scrod', which is a fish. You're all three!"
"Shut up, Helen."
"Todd!"
"Sorry."
His mother shook her head, and his sister laughed. "Now you're both in trouble. Todd, you're grounded until Tuesday, which is your tutoring night. Helen? You don't get to watch My Little Pony for a week."
"Okay." The curly-haired girl pouted, then sang under her breath: "Todd, Todd, the odd, clod scrod…."
"Mom, she's doing it again - "
"Not another word. Upstairs. Now." He didn't need to be told twice, and neither did Helen. They clambered up the steps, trying to race one another. As usual Todd won, and as usual Helen gave him a little punch.
"Nice try, squirt," he grinned. "Maybe next time." He knew that wouldn't happen. As his little sister stomped off to her room, decorated with the characters of her favorite TV show, he sought refuge in his den.
Like any animal's burrow, it was dark and musty-smelling, but the floor of Todd's bedroom was littered with comic books instead of leaves and sticks. There were issues of Massive Monsters, Tales of Weird Science, and almost every Dopey Dog installment. Looking at them, he was suddenly reminded that he was missing number fifty-four.
"That Ghostbuster guy got it," he said in a huff. "Hmph. I'm not afraid of ghosts, because there's no such thing." Massive monsters were scary enough, but the reason he liked them was that they weren't real. At the end of the day, or a long night under his bedcovers with a flashlight on, they would simply disappear.
He folded his arms across his chest and stood up with a start: "Where'd my book go?" Feeling a flash of apprehension, Todd darted down the hallway and toward the stairs. "There it is." Mysteries of the Worm lay sprawled on the landing. He realized that it must have fallen out of his shirt during the race with Helen. Protectively, he scooped it up and returned to his lair. He set the book down on his desk with great care.
Opposite it was a volume he wished he'd never have to read again: Mathematics Essentials, Grade 3.
Todd gave it a death glare and turned on his desk lamp. In the brightness, he could make out a long box.
Smiling, he went over to it: "Annie?" he murmured. "Are you in there?"
Inside was a mass of high-quality garden soil, although there were no plants growing within the box. What Todd found as he dug down into the dirt with his index finger was a long, slimy, pinkish-white creature.
"Safe and sound," he said. "I'll hide you again, but I wanted to make sure you were okay."
Of course, Annie said nothing. However, she did wriggle up to Todd's finger and touch the tip. Poor girl, he thought. Technically, you have male and female reproductive organs, so you could reproduce by yourself, but most worms need mates to do that. If he had his way, Todd would buy that mail-order worm farm he wanted, but he knew it was a lost cause. For one thing, his mom hated any kind of creepy, crawly critter, and secondly, he wouldn't be able to resist putting Annie's future young on others' dinner plates. Therefore, he had to be content with her alone.
Taking pains not to startle or crush her, Todd covered Annie back up with soil. She was far more than his hobby or pet. She was his world, and when he grew up, he wanted to be a helminthologist.
For now, he was baffled by "Multiplying and Dividing Fractions." Sighing, he opened his math textbook.
It took Todd all the way until dinnertime to do the first ten problems of his assignment. By then, he couldn't care less if the words numerator, denominator, and reciprocal vanished from his vocabulary. He didn't understand any of it, and worse, Helen kept bragging about how well she had done on her last math quiz.
"I got a hundred." she said. "I bet Todd got a zero. Didn't you?"
"No," he shot back, although getting ten questions wrong out of twelve was pretty close.
"You really should concentrate more on your homework," said his father.
"What do you think I've been doing up until now?" asked Todd.
"Easy, sport. Just making a suggestion. How's your squirmy little friend doing?"
"A-OK." He paused. "She'd be even more so if you'd let me buy that worm farm."
"Eww!" That was Helen, cringing.
"I agree," said his mother, and then she had a suggestion. "If you get your math grade up, maybe."
Todd almost leapt up from his chair. "Really, Mom? You promise?"
"I promise," she said, believing that this vow was one she wouldn't have to keep.
Her son whooped with delight and picked up his plate. "Can I go upstairs and give these to Annie?"
"Wait a second; those are green beans. They're good for you."
"They're the tough stems that I can't chew, and they always get stuck in my teeth."
"I thought I cut those off…All right." She smiled, and Todd went to deliver the spoils of dinner's war. He hadn't won a victory - not yet - but Alice Dexter Ward always kept her word. Even if it meant more worms.
After a last treat of Rocky Road ice cream for dessert, he dutifully returned to his own execution. Numbers were instruments of torture for him. 1 was a red-hot fireplace poker; 2 was himself, kneeling and begging for mercy. 7 was a dagger's blade, 8 a pair of shackles, and 6 and 9 both resembled a hangman's noose.
"I hate this stuff," Todd murmured to himself. He could already envision the red-inked check marks that would condemn his efforts in class. Lifting his eyes up from the assignment, he spotted his library book.
Mysteries of the Worm. It waited silently for him, as did the multi-segmented menace on the cover.
Todd glanced from one to the other: mathematics to monster, homework to hair-raising tales, and endless problems to an escapist solution. Forget it. I can always copy off of Chuck Berger in homeroom tomorrow.
He opened the tantalizing tome to its first page. On it was a strange epigraph, clearly not in English:
Tibi, magnum Innominandum, signa stellarum nigrarum et bufoniformis Sadoquae sigillum.
Todd puzzled over these words - if they were words - once more, and tried to pronounce them. After three failures, he gave up and flipped the pages to view the spine-tingling array of extra-dimensional horrors.
"Nine o'clock, Todd," called his mother from downstairs. "Time for bed."
He heaved a whoof of tired exasperation, closed the book, and cried, "Good night!" After putting on his pajamas and brushing his teeth, he slunk back to his den and climbed into bed. "You too, Annie." Click went his Dopey Dog lamp, and within minutes he was asleep. The Mysteries rested on his bedside table.
At precisely midnight the Worm, the Not-to-be-Named, raised its ethereal head from within their pages.
It was nigh-formless now, barely a shadow of its true self, but if it had a host to inhabit…
The blind Vermis glanced around the room, searching for one. There was a boy, snoring and seemingly safe underneath his bedcovers, but he wouldn't do. He was human, for one thing, and the Worm preferred something closer to its nature. That was what It had used the last time, during the last thousand years, when It had come within a hair's breadth of reaching its goal. Moreover, the boy was Its conjurer - the only entity to which It would bow, until the time was right. The Worm needed its own worm to possess.
Its ghostly frame wriggled out of the paper portal through which it had come, and towards a long, thin box.