Roll Them Bones
"That's odd." Egon Spangler raised his PKE meter. He turned in place. "I have another spike."
"Another ghost?" Ray Stantz looked around, goggles covering his eyes. He adjusted the lens while pointing the wand of his proton thrower away from them.
"I don't think so." Egon fiddled with the dials on the meter. "I have a bad feeling about this, Ray."
"One thing at a time." Stantz started down the hall. "Let's bust this ghost, then we can look around for whatever pinged the meter."
Egon frowned as he waved the meter around. Maybe the spike had been an echo, or some other ghost in the area. It might even be some kind of phenomena that dumped psychokinetic energy into the area.
Extradimensional gates were known to do that.
Egon and Ray had been called to deal with a roaming thing that liked to gibber at the occupants of an apartment building gone condos. The residents wanted the thing gone so they could sleep at night. The job went on the call sheet, and here they were in the halls of the building looking for the thing.
So far they hadn't seen anything to be excited over despite the high PKE count.
The only thing they knew for sure was something was roaming the halls, and it was avoiding them.
"What was that?" Ray turned his head back and forth.
"Sounds like the gibbering we were told about." Egon pointed down the hall. "It's coming from down there."
"Let's see what this ghost looks like." Ray skulked down the hall, both hands aiming the proton thrower in front of him. He hoped no one came out in the hall at the wrong moment.
Egon hung his meter on his belt and followed his friend as quietly as he could on the thin sand colored carpet. He kept an eye behind them as they advanced.
Ghosts were fond of the ambush, when they weren't obsessing over something.
"I see it." Ray pointed toward the stairwell. "It just went into the stairwell."
Egon hurried to the door. He grabbed the bar of the door and waited for Ray to get into position. The portly ghostbuster nodded. He threw open the door, and Stantz charged through, sweeping his weapon left and right to clear the landing.
"Not here." Ray looked around. "No ectoplasm on the walls or stairs."
Egon pulled out his meter and waved it around. It spiked again as he used it to scan the area. He frowned at the reading.
"It went up." He pointed with the meter.
"Right." Stantz started up the stairs. "Maybe it likes pacing on the roof."
Egon followed silently. He listened to the meter as it danced around. Two rapid spikes like that couldn't be good.
He pushed open the door so the ghostbuster could step out on the roof. He swept the meter around. He jogged in the indicated direction, wand ready. He paused when he spotted the ghost laughing in midair. It rushed toward another apartment building across the street. Both men blasted away yellow ribbons of light at the glowing fog. It danced around the energy and entered the other building through a window.
"Do you see what I see?" Ray raised his goggles. He holstered his thrower in the rack built into the backpack he wore.
"I'm at a loss to explain what we're seeing." Spengler played his meter around in the air. "Low PKE energy from what I am reading."
"Maybe it's some kind of illusion." Stantz looked down in the street.
The street between the buildings was filled with traffic. Anyone who happened to look up was aghast.
"I think that would be preferable to a tree growing through the middle of an apartment building in Manhattan." Spengler pointed. "That looks like a pack of hyenas to me."
"We have to get over there." Ray grinned. "This might be some kind of extradimensional manifestation. Think about what we can learn from this."
"I'm more worried about what will happen if this continues to spread." The ghostbuster adjusted his glasses. "We need to get Peter and Winston down here."
"Could it be the source of those spikes on the meter?" Ray reached into his overalls pockets and pulled out a cell phone.
"Possibly." They started walking to the stairwell. "And our laughing ghost went in there."
"Hey, Janine." Stantz scratched his head as they headed down to where they had left the Ecto-1. "Is Pete or Winston around? We're going to need them."
He listened to the secretary. He nodded as they clumped down the stairs.
"We have something going on across the street." Ray looked at Egon. The other man raised his eyebrows. "We think it's a tree taking over the neighborhood."
He nodded again. He tightened up his expression.
"I know. Something new with this job all the time." Ray paused at the next landing. "We're hoping it's not what it looks like."
They stepped out of the stairwell as Ray nodded to the phone. They crossed the foyer to get to the front door of the apartment building.
"It looks like the building slipped back in time to when there wasn't a building standing there." Ray nodded. "We'll be okay unless the tree area reverses and strands us in the past."
He closed the phone and put it back in his pocket.
"She's calling them." He walked to the back of the white car with its signature logo on the doors. The lights flashed, but the siren was silent. He opened the back door and stored his pack in its storage space. "They'll have to get a taxi, or something, to get here."
Spengler pulled off his own pack and racked it. He checked his meter again. He shook his head.
"I don't think it's some kind of temporal anomaly." He straightened his glasses. "I think there's a spatial factor involved."
"That would explain the hyenas." Ray looked down the street. "And the zebra."
He pointed down the street. A zebra glared at them. Then it ran into an alley.
"That can't be good." Egon shook his head. "Let's drive around and wait for the others."
The ghostbusters piled into the Ecto. Ray pulled away from the curb and they circled the block. He pulled into a spot away from the tree taking over the building. He didn't want to lose the car to something that didn't belong in the city.
The antennae on the PKE meter waved in the air as it pointed at the tree. A window exploded above the street. A woman on a limb dangled in the air. She held on for dear life.
"Hmm." Egon hopped out of the car. "The tree is still growing."
"We can't wait on the others." Ray jumped out and looked at the woman. "This thing is a hazard."
"Agreed." The ghostbusters pulled out their packs and strapped them on. Click went the power buttons. The accelerators hummed.
"Let's try the door." Spengler headed for the door in question.
"Hang on, lady." Ray cupped his hands over his mouth to act as a megaphone. "We're coming to get you."
Egon tried the door. It wouldn't open. He stepped back. He was fortunate to have a key right there on his back. He pulled the wand loose from its holder and pushed the button. He sliced the door out of his way.
The building had the same layout as the other one. The most obvious exception was the huge tree in the middle of the foyer. It grew through the ceiling and up out of the building itself.
Egon frowned at the way the roots appeared to be digging into the floor while he watched. If the thing kept growing, it could topple the building onto another one.
Their throwers wouldn't saw that thing down. They needed the others to do that.
"Blow the door to the stairwell." Ray pointed his wand at the tree. "This thing is huge."
"It's still growing." Spengler took aim across the room. He triggered his thrower. The yellow beam lashed out and cut the door down.
"We'll worry about that later." Ray hopped over the roots and headed up the stairwell. "Fifth floor."
The ghostbusters ran up the stairs. They paused on the fifth floor. A scream pulled them in one direction. A girl yelling attracted their attention the other way.
A wild laugh echoed in the hall.
"Take the girl." Egon headed toward where the woman was still screaming. He kicked the door in, holding the wand at the ready.
Ray echoed his move down the hall. He smiled when he saw the gibbering ghost. The green fog looked at the wrecked door with jack-o-lantern eyes. Accelerated particles wrapped around the ghost. He dropped something in his hand. It looked like a pair of dice.
"No!" The girl stretched out her hands. She caught the dice with a sigh of relief. "Stupid whatever you are."
"It's a free roaming repeating vapor." Ray smiled as he held the thing in place. "Could you help me out, kids?"
Egon stepped into the apartment where the woman had been screaming. He crossed to the window. The limb had broken through a wall to push the lady through the window. That appeared to be an extremely unnatural rate of growth.
He holstered the particle thrower and leaned out of the window. He reached out while lying on the limb. He grabbed the woman's arm in one hand.
"I'm going to try to pull you up." Spengler took a deep breath. "Count of three, and then try to hook your other arm over the limb."
"I got it." She latched on to his arm with her hand. She took a deep breath.
"One...two...three." The ghostbuster straightened his back, pulling on her arm with both hands.
The woman let go with her other arm. She swung for a moment before securing her arm over the wood. She quickly swung a leg up to lay on the limb.
"Let's get off this thing before it breaks under our weight." Egon backed up until he was inside the ruined apartment. He dropped down on the floor. He assisted the woman to get inside and on her own feet.
"Thank you." She brushed off her sweater and pants. "I don't know what's going on. The place wasn't like this this morning."
"This might be some kind of incursion from another dimension." Egon waved his meter around. "You might want to get outside before something else happens."
"All right." She picked her way through the debris while looking around at her ruined home. "My insurance will never believe this."
"Hey, Egon!" Ray nodded at the woman as he passed her. He had a smoking trap hanging from his hip, and two kids trailing him. The girl had a wooden case under her arm. "I think you need to see this."
"Hi, Mrs. Allison." The boy waved at the woman as she walked away.
"Who are these children?" Spengler knew by the way his partner was smiling that he had uncovered the explanation for the tree in the building, and had discovered something in the unnatural world they hadn't seen before.
"This is Jan and Jason Spectros." Ray turned at a noise in the hall. "I think we should talk about this downstairs."
"All right." Egon eyed the wooden case under Jan's arm. "We don't have a lot of time before this building collapses."
"You didn't happen to see any hyenas?" Jason watched the shadows of the hall for anything to jump out at him.
"They were upstairs on the roof." Spengler led the way to the stairs. The group started down.
Ray checked the street before he led the way to the car. He opened the back passenger door and waved the kids into the car.
"What's going on, Ray?" The ghostbusters stood away from the car so they could talk.
"The kids found a board game." Stantz bounced on his feet in his excitement. "When they started playing, animals and this tree came out of the game."
"Interesting." Spengler looked around at the spreading devastation. "How do we stop it?"
"They have to finish their game." Ray frowned. "I had hoped we could study it at the firehouse."
"I think that is an extremely bad idea." A board game that changed reality was interesting. Having it around the containment unit might have unintended consequences.
"We need somewhere we can go so they can finish the game." Stantz spotted the zebra again. "Maybe if we kept moving in Ecto."
"We'll take the game back to the firehouse and see if we can come up with something safer than letting more wildlife loose in the city." Egon straightened his glasses.
"Great." Ray smiled.
2
The Ghostbusters convened in Egon and Ray's lab at the firehouse. Peter Venkman had his eyebrows raised at the amount of lightning flying around the room. He had been friends with Egon and Ray for years before they had started their business. He knew the signs of finding some new discovery that no one had ever found before. He could see it in the way they had fallen into mythic precedents and technobabble.
Times like these made him wonder if he had done the right thing in foiling Egon's attempt to gain psychic powers through trepanning. And then he considered a Spengler with psychic powers and knew he had made the right move.
"This reminds me of the dancing toaster demonstration." Winston Zeddmore crossed his arms as he watched the display screens.
Winston had been hired to help with the backlog created by the resurgence of Gozer when the business had first started. He had stuck with the original trio through thick and thin.
"The one where it caught fire, or the one when it danced on the pool table?" Venkman made sure the fire extinguisher was well at hand in case things blew up.
"I am leaning towards the fire one." Winston smiled slightly.
"Hey, guys." Ray had a grin on his round face. "You have to see this."
"Definitely the fire one." Peter put on a faint smile. "What's going on, guys? Who're the munchkins?"
"These are our newest clients." Ray gestured for the kids to come closer. "Jan and Jace, this is Peter Venkman and Winston Zeddmore. They found this thing. It's totally awesome."
"It looks like a plain board game to me." Peter stretched out his hand.
"No." Jan raised her hand to block his movement. "Don't touch it. It's dangerous."
"Excuse me?" Peter paused at the fear in her voice.
"She's right, Peter." Egon gestured at one of the screens. "What we have is a gate to another dimension like Ivo Shandor's building. It seems to have a limited malicious intelligence, and it brings creatures from that dimension to ours according to the roll of the dice."
"Shoot the game with a thrower?" Winston waved at the wood board. "What happens if we do that?"
"The kids are stuck with wild animals looking for them, a tree growing through their building, and no place to live." Ray shrugged. "Or all of Manhattan is flipped over there, and a section of that place is brought here."
"So we don't shoot it." Peter looked at the display. "How do we stop it?"
"We let the kids play out their game." Egon polished his glasses with a handkerchief. "Only we run interference until one of them wins."
"How dangerous could this be?" Peter waved at the wooden folding board. "It's just a game."
"A pack of hyenas tried to eat us, a zebra kicked in our bathroom door, and this tree destroyed our apartment building." Jason counted the things off on his fingers.
"That sounds dangerous." Winston rubbed the back of his head. "I take it we're not going to let them play the rest of their game here."
"We think that the game would sabotage the containment unit downstairs if we did that." Ray paused at the looks he was getting. "We do have some animal spirits down there. They could wreck havoc if they were cut loose again."
"So we take them someplace away from anyone else, let them roll the dice until one of them wins, stop any animal that shows up." Peter smiled. "Sounds easy enough."
"It could be other things than animals." Egon adjusted his glasses. "There might be a degree of escalation as the kids get to the end."
"But if we can get to the end, everything should go away according to the rules." Jan pointed to one of the sides where the dice had been. The rules were simple and easy to follow.
Venkman noted that the extraordinary effects of the game were minimized to trap any kid who rolled the dice into playing.
"We're also measuring the PKE spikes so we can counter this type of thing in the future." Ray showed them a digital recording of what they had learned so far. "The next time we come across a gate like this, we will be able to modify the packs to shut the gate down without having to cross the streams and potentially blow ourselves up."
"I'm sold." Peter smiled. "This sounds like the least lethal thing we have done all year. I say we do it. Let's roll them bones."
"Couldn't resist, could you?" Ray gave him one of those looks.
"Nope." Peter smiled. "I got just the place we can use for this."
"Do you really think you can help us?" Jace looked at the four adults.
"We've taken down every type of ghost and spirit in the tri-state area." Winston smiled. "We can handle anything your game can throw at us."
"He's right." Ray closed the board game up. "We're the Ghostbusters, and this is just another type of haunting."
Egon nodded as the kids looked at him.
"Don't worry. Just concentrate on your dice rolling." He saved all the data and shut all of the electronics down. They would have to analyze what they had gathered, but he foresaw a time when they could turn interdimensional portals on and off like a light switch.
It would be simpler than bringing the Statue of Liberty to life if they could work out the math and physics necessary.
It might even be a sideline they could use to further what they knew about the paranormal world.
Peter stowed backpacks and ghost traps in the Ecto. He whistled off key as he worked. Winston grabbed the keys for the converted ambulance from their spot on the wall. Egon packed his meters and Ray got a ectoplasm sprayer and made sure it was loaded with positive slime.
Something banged against the door. The busters looked at the wooden barrier.
Ray pulled on the blower and readied the hose to shoot. Another crash sounded against the door.
"Backseat, kids." Winston got behind the wheel. He started the engine.
Peter pulled on his thrower as Egon went to the double doors the Ecto would have to drive through to get out on the street.
Peter jogged to the regular door cut into the big doors for just people. Ray waddled behind him.
Peter grabbed the knob with one hand, aimed the wand with the other. He didn't want to shoot anything alive with it, but nothing was getting into the firehouse without a fight.
"Ready?" He called, checking on everyone else. Egon had the big doors. Winston sat behind the wheel of the Ecto. The motor was on. The kids were with Winston. Ray was almost directly behind him.
Janine Melnitz, their secretary, stood at her desk, proton thrower strapped over her shirt and skirt.
Peter waited for the next bang before pulling open the little door. A white and black horse stood outside the firehouse, ready to kick again. It looked around in surprise. Then Ray sprayed it down with positive goo. It staggered away from the door, head down on its chest.
Egon threw open the big doors for the white car. He stepped back as Winston rolled out on the street. They pushed the doors closed to keep any other animals outside.
Peter scanned the street as Egon and Ray got in the vehicle. Ray had to lay his tank down in the back and climb in after it. He pulled his own pack off and jumped in an empty seat. He slammed the door as Winston pulled away from their headquarters.
"Janine?" Ray looked back at the firehouse.
"She's safe as long as we have the game, and the kids." Egon turned around in his seat. "Where are we going, Peter?"
"Yankee Stadium." Peter handed his particle thrower to Ray. "It's a clear open area where we can shoot anything that gets close to us while we're guarding the kids."
"And no one is around." Winston smiled as he turned on the yellow spinner lights.
"It could still be dangerous." Egon killed their smiles just like that.
"It will be fine." Peter checked the mirrors. He didn't see any out of place animals. "We only have to hold whatever happens for five turns at the most. We can do that."
Winston headed for the Bronx. The emergency lights helped clear the lanes for him as he sped along.
"Pull into the old stadium, Winston." Peter watched his mirror for any more trouble. "As soon as we get there, we'll finish the game."
"Have you guys really saved the world?" Jan clutched the game on her lap.
"Sure." Peter smiled. "Plenty of times."
"Mostly we saved the city." Winston shook his head. "But we have done some things that would make your hair curl."
"Like what?" Jason looked at his sister. She seemed ready to explode.
"Let's see. We kicked the Boogeyman's butt on his home turf. We saved Paris by turning the Eiffel Tower into a ghost trap. We cleared the Brooklyn Bridge of trolls." Peter held up a hand to count off their exploits. "We saved Halloween once."
"Really?" Jason leaned forward. "How did you do that?"
Peter broke into a story where he tracked down the spirit of Samhain on his own, engaged in a hand to hand fight, a duel with fire blasts and particle thrower, and then trapped the errant spirit. The other ghostbusters groaned at the exaggerations.
"And that's how we saved Halloween." Pete smiled at the kids.
"Sounds fishy to me." Jan shook her head.
"Sounds like a load of bull." Jason was giving Peter a look.
"Yankee Stadium." Winston cut into the conversation before it could get heated. He pulled into the lot outside of the stadium.
"Let's get out on the field." Peter got out, and pulled on his pack. "We need a clear space to operate."
Egon and Ray got out. Ray pull on his tank while Egon grabbed his pack out of its space and tugged it on. He waved for the kids to get out of the car. Zeddmore stood with them, pack in hand.
"Are you sure this will work?" Ray waddled under the weight of the slime blower on his back.
"As sure as you guys were about crossing the streams." Peter tugged on the door. It was locked. He blasted out the lock with his thrower.
"That's comforting." Stantz entered the stadium and started following the signs to cross to the bottom level and out on the green diamond. The others followed, watching for anyone who might try to stop them.
They stepped out on the field from the home team's dugout. Everything was still clear. All they had to do was survive playing the game.
Jan placed the game down on the pitcher's mound. She flipped open the game and picked up the dice. She looked around.
"Go ahead." Ray nodded. "We'll protect you."
"So I roll the dice." Jan dropped the twin cubes on the sideboard. "The piece moves by itself. The thing in the center gives some kind of clue to what's coming out of the game next."
"Look up in the sky, it's spit is like lye." Jason read the floating letters in the center of the board as soon as they appeared. "What does that mean?"
"Vultures." Egon pointed at flying shapes zooming in over the wall. "Roll, Jason, before they get too close."
Jason picked up the dice and flung them against the backstop. The dice flopped back with his number.
"Flying ice ahead, perhaps it's time you fled." He looked up. "Flying ice?"
"Hail." Spengler glanced at the others. "There's going to be a hailstorm."
"Dugout." Peter fired a beam to scare one of the vultures off. "Get the game. Go."
Jan picked up the dice and threw them down before closing the game. She tucked it under her arm. Jason ran with her to the dugout. The ghostbusters fell in behind them.
Particle beams and sprayer slime flew as clouds gathered overhead. Jan and Jason jumped in the dugout. Ice missed her hand as she moved.
The vultures veered off under the onslaught from the heavens. One took a hit on its wing but still managed to glide away under its own power.
The guys dropped down inside the dugout. Hail continued to lash the field as they watched.
"I thought this was just a game." Winston pointed at one of the hailstones impacted in the ground. It was as big as his fist.
"Some game." Peter shook his head.
"Go ahead and roll, Jan." Egon opened the box on the player's bench.
"I already did." She pointed to her playing piece. The hippo had moved closer to the center of the board.
"Jason." Egon checked the sky. The clue had come and gone before they had opened the box.
"That doesn't look good." Peter nodded at the pitcher's mound. Giant ants burst out of the ground. They looked around with waving antennae. They started toward the dugout.
"Roll, Jason." Egon handed him the dice.
Jason dropped the dice. They bounced once before spinning around. Then they flopped down on two sixes. His elephant started moving.
"It's not a trick that the ground is moving quick." He looked around. "What does that mean?"
"It means we're moving." Peter waved them into the locker room. "Let's go."
Jan grabbed the game. Egon picked her and Jason up under his arms and carried them inside the building.
"The floor!" Ray jumped to the locker room door. "Look out!"
"Crap." Peter threw himself out of the dugout. He helped Winston onto the field.
The floor of the dugout had turned into quicksand.
"Finish the game, Ray." Peter turned to face the ants. "We'll head for the bleachers and hold the ants off to buy time."
Particle beams threw up dirt as the two ghostbusters fled for their lives.
3
The kids set up the game on a bench in the locker room. All the lockers were empty and open. Egon guarded the door from the field while Ray went to the door that led to the interior of the stadium.
Jan rolled the dice. They landed, but nothing happened. She tried again.
"Nothing's happening." She tried once more. "It's broken."
"What's wrong?" Spengler looked at the board. They were so close to stopping the trouble. The game couldn't be broken now.
"The game won't work." Jan showed him the board.
"Didn't Jason roll two sixes?" Egon focused on the rule about doubles.
"Yes." The boy nodded. "They were boxcars."
"He gets to roll again." The ghostbuster pointed to the rule. "Doubles go again."
"Roll high, Jace." Jan handed him the dice. "You only have four spaces to move."
He shook the cubes in his hand. He flipped them on the board. One dropped on a one immediately before it even got close to the edge of the rolling area. The other spun in place before settling on a two.
"Oh no." Jan picked up the dice as she looked around for the next menace.
"You have angered the tribe, best run and hide." Jason went to the nearest locker and opened it. It was too small for him to get into.
The door to the locker room crashed open. Black tribesmen in loincloths and war paint started to charge into the room. They waved spears and clubs at the four.
Ray backed away from the door as he hosed them down with the sprayer. Positive slime made them feel less angry, and more willing to just stop and admire the architecture.
"We have to move." Egon waved the kids through the distracted horde. "Ray?"
"Almost out of slime." Ray sprayed the tribe down with the remainder as they ran into the hall. "Definitely out now."
"Get rid of it." Egon covered the hall with his blaster. "It'll only slow us down now."
Ray unstrapped the blower and shoved it into an empty office. He pulled the door closed as quietly as possible.
"Let's head back toward the concession area." Egon pointed. "The tribe will be out for hours. All we need is two more turns."
The four ran down the hall until they saw signs for the bathrooms and vendors. They took cover behind a counter. No one was in the area as far as they could see.
"Go ahead, Jan." Ray looked around for a weapon. "We're almost done."
She opened the box. She shook the dice in her hand. She let fly. The dice moved her piece almost to the end in that one throw.
"Not enough." She slumped over the board.
"Sweeter honey has never been made, but a price has to be paid." Jason looked around. "What's that buzzing?"
"Bees." Ray pointed down the hall. "It's a swarm of bees."
"Roll, Jason." Egon stood and fired his blaster against the ceiling of the corridor. The tile fell down on the swarm in a blazing mass. "This is the end of the game."
Jason grabbed the dice, eyes on the bees. He dropped the dice on the board. The bees surrounded the adventurers with suicidal anger. The piece moved to the center of the game. A word formed on the round half sphere that gave out the clues to the next menace.
"Jumanji!" The kids jumped up and down. "We did it. We won."
The bees paused in uncertainty. Should they sting? They buzzed around just out of reach of the kids.
A funnel of air appeared over the game. One end touched the black sphere. The other end floated in the air. It plucked the bees from the air. The other animals and the tribal warriors flew down the hall of the building. They fell into the whirlwind and vanished from sight. One hand remained to wave goodbye before it joined the rest of its owner. The funnel dropped into the game and shut off. The game's sides shut with a snap.
"I'm glad that's over with." Ray picked up the game. "I think it's time to get the guys and head out of here."
Egon pulled his meter from his belt. He ran it around in the air. The device told him that the place was clean of supernatural activity.
"It looks like the stadium is clear." He put the meter back. "I think we should put the game in the safe at the firehouse while we try to figure out how it does what it does."
"I don't think that's a good idea." Jan looked at her clean clothes. "It might be better to leave it alone."
"Please." Jason's face took on a puppy dog aspect.
"I think they're right, Egon." Ray shrugged at his partner's expression. "We don't want to blow up the firehouse by accident."
"I guess we can lock it up and make sure no one else can be hurt by it." Egon rubbed his chin.
"Thank you." Jan smiled. "Thanks for helping us."
"That's what we do." Ray smiled. "We help the helpless."
Peter and Winston appeared in the hall. They had racked the wands for their throwers.
"We're done." Egon picked up the game. "We can drop the kids off and then head home."
"I won't be playing Monopoly for a while." Peter smiled.
"Where did all the animals go?" Winston looked at the undamaged stadium hall.
"Back in the game." Ray pointed at the board. "As soon as one of the players wins, everything starts going back to what it was before the game started."
"So we're done?" Peter flexed his shoulders. "I think it's time to get some food, and watch a game."
"Let's drop off the kids first." Egon waved back toward the door. "Someone might be looking for them."
Ray jogged to the empty office and pulled out the blower. He strapped it on to make it easier to carry.
"We have food." Jason looked at his sister. She was in agreement. "You guys can eat at our place if it's still there."
"I don't see why not." Ray started for the car.
"Sounds like a plan to me." Peter nodded. "And I never pass up a chance for a free meal."
"Sounds like Slimer to me." Winston trooped along at the back of the crowd.
"Don't mention him." Venkman grimaced. "We don't need him showing up and scarfing everything down before we do."
"Slimer?" Jason paused in the walk. "Who's that?"
Peter opened his mouth to say my mortal enemy but Egon broke in, "He's a ghost we captured but was released and now wanders around the firehouse. He allows us to study him so we can make better ghostbusting gear."
"He's their pet." Jan smiled.
"Guinea pig, actually." Egon corrected her.
"Mascot." Ray took off the blower as they found the Ecto waiting for them.
"Friend." Winston grinned at the look on Peter's face.
"He's a troublemaker and all around pain in my butt." Peter took off his pack and placed it in the rack.
"That's also a reason why we keep him around." Egon stowed his pack away.
"Do you think the tree is still at our place?" Jan climbed into the center of the back seat.
"All the damage done by the game seems to be cleaned up." Egon placed the closed box in the compartment used for spare equipment. He made sure to lock it down. "The tree should be erased also."
"We'll know soon enough." Winston got behind the wheel.
Ray gave him the address as he climbed into the passenger seat. He slumped down, wishing he had a cigarette.
"Here you go." Peter lifted Jason up so he could sit beside his sister, then took the seat by the door.
Egon took the other side silently.
Winston started the converted ambulance up and they rolled away from the old stadium. They headed back toward Manhattan. He cut the lights on as they rolled through traffic.
Winston turned on the street and cruised along looking for the right address. He didn't see a building with a tree in it.
"It's right there." Jan leaned over the seat and pointed at one of the buildings. "The tree's gone."
"What's this about cooking?" Peter perked up.
Winston pulled up in front of the building. He got out and dropped some change in the parking meter.
The rest got out, following the kids into the apartment building. Egon pulled out his meter. He ran it through the air. He got negative results where the roots of the tree had been.
"It looks clear." He kept the meter running as they went to the elevator. "Let's see what upstairs looks like."
They rode up in the elevator, listening to the meter and the tinny music inside the cab. The doors opened and the hall stood empty of wooden appendages.
Jan led the way to their apartment. She put her key in the lock. The door opened on its own.
"Where have you been?" A woman looked down on the siblings.
"They've been helping us, ma'am." Ray stepped forward. "My name is Ray Stantz. We're the Ghostbusters. You're children helped us out with a crossdimensional rip with extreme complications. We couldn't have done it without them."
"Is this true?" She looked down at her kids.
"We saved the world, Mom." Jason hugged her. "It was awesome."