Chapter Two: Across the Other Side
It was a whole new plane of existence, a rather somewhat inhuman dimension; the environment was covered with dead trees, some animal-like skeletons were half buried in the ground as well as some trees grew through them, the air felt really cold, the skies were gray and dark, and it was even covered with chilling fog. It was a different world, and Rita was trapped in it.
Rita lay onto the ground, knocked out in an unconscious statement; some of the Class I Osteo-Focused Swarmers from before were just circling around the knocked out recruit, but didn't bother to attack or anything. Then, just a few minutes later, Rita finally woke up from her unconsciousness; she felt a little dizzy at first, but she ignored the condition as she sat up.
"Ooh… M-My head…" She spoke, feeling a bit woozy.
As Rita finally stood up to her feet, she finally noticed the surroundings; she realized she wasn't at the museum anymore.
"Whoa. W-What is this place?" She wondered, feeling a bit nervous at first.
Then, from behind Rita, a large boulder began to slowly move upward, uncovering a large skeletal-like ghostly figure in the presence. The thing is, however, it wasn't a large boulder at all rather a pair of outstretched, decaying wings! The skeletal figure was actually another large dragon lich; only this one was very smaller than the metaspecter but was the size of an elephant and a half, compared to Rita's height. Its head was more skull-like, eye sockets were glowing a fiery blue, head horns were forward facing structure, and its whole body still had flesh but was a very bony figure and was colored a ghastly dark gray and white. Not only was this dragon a decaying corpse, but more ghostly than even the large metaspecter from before.
Frightened by the sight of the creature, Rita finally started to run away just as soon as the creature started to lunge for her. She quickly ran across 20 to 30 feet away until she came up to a large tree with skulls and skeletal hands growing through. She hid behind, hoping the spirited figure wouldn't find her; but then the tree started to burst into flames from mostly the front side. Rita covered herself for protection with her arms but then she quickly took a peek from behind the tree and saw the creature nearing into position toward Rita.
As the monster came close, it quickly lunged right toward Rita but with quick reflexes, Rita ran for her life.
Now the chase was on; a couple minutes after Rita took off, the ghostly dragon continued to try and grab Rita, but with luck Rita quickly dodged each of the dragon's attack. The, Rita began to unzip her skateboard satchel in order to take out Ecto-5 for a faster getaway; unfortunately the zipper of the bag wouldn't budge open, it was now stuck.
"Oh come on, not now!" Rita cried with a frightened tone.
Suddenly, a large blaze of fire whizzed right past Rita's head, hitting a large tree. Rita had been lucky she wasn't hit, but noticed the undead dragon was still chasing her; so she just continued on running.
The creature neared itself closer to Rita for another attack, but just as it prepared to breathe another stream of fire something blasted onto it instead. The creature bellowed in pain by a somewhat surge of a fireball that somehow possesses the same basic effect of the Ghostbusters' positively charged particle streams of the Neutrona Wands. After the ghost was shot, a flash of solid black flew over the creature and somehow headed right toward Rita.
Rita didn't notice the ghostly creature had been attacked, she just kept on running at a much fast pace like a track star athlete, trying to keep herself away from the hideous decaying creature. Rita then quickly stepped and jumped over a decaying tree, but just one second before she hit the ground to continue running, something finally grabbed her by the arm and is now being taken up into the air!
"Ahh! Oh my God! What is- (Gasp) AAAAAAAAAHHHHH!" Rita cried in horror as she looked up to see what grabbed her.
Sure enough, it was another black dragon. This one had the same basic features as the one that escaped the museum's portal, but this one seemed to have some slight age to it, one of its eyes seemed to have a darker shade of green than the other, and it looked a little pudgier than the escapee.
The new dragon flew higher and farther away from the ghost dragon, carrying Rita in its arms tightly. It then turned to see the dragon lich, and just simply hovered in the air; it snarled and growled viciously, not at Rita but mostly yet strangely at the ghostly creature. The spirit creature roared at the black dragon, but then the black creature itself, began to roar in the air as though it was calling for something. Rita then heard new roars, similar to the black dragon's, and finally notices six more black dragons flying individually; then they all surround the ghostly figure and began to fire particle stream based fireballs, which effectively injured the ghost.
Rita watched in amazement how these black dragons, each one the size of a Clydesdale including the one holding Rita, perform these astonishing attacks toward the ghost dragon, almost as if they were Ghostbusters as well. One of them; with brown eyes, slightly gray around its spinal back frills, and seemed to be the most intelligent of the group roared mostly to four younger black dragons as they begin to breath out their own version of the particle streams right at the dragon lich.
The ghostly figure became weaker and weaker by the black dragons' fire blasts as it tries to escape the creatures' attacks; but then, after taking several more hits, it started to deteriorate. The dark dragons' fire blasts seemed to have an effect that which could be able to combust an entity after several shots. Suddenly, after a final shot from the group of four younger black dragons, the dragon lich finally depolarize into nothing, like it was never there to begin with. All the six black dragons roared as a somewhat sign of victory and then began to fly over toward Rita and the large pudgy dragon that was still holding her in its massive arms.
But then, as the pudgy dragon began to take off in mid-air, Rita started to struggle from its grip, trying to escape.
"Ugh! Let go of me; put me down!" She cried mostly in fear. "Put me… DOWN!"
At the same time Rita accidentally elbowed the dark dragon by its lower jaw, which suddenly made it let go of Rita right in the air! Rita fell from the dragon's grasp, over at least 300 feet up in the air; she screamed in panicking fear. Then, after recovering from Rita's punch, the pudgy dragon swooped over and dived down toward Rita, reaching out its large paws as it dived closer to Rita. As it reached three seconds before hitting the ground, the dragon immediately grabs one of Rita's legs and instantaneously pulls up back toward the sky.
Moments later, the dragon carried Rita back up in the air by her leg, and finally flew toward the six other dark dragons in which it called upon earlier. All seven of these unusual creatures flew across the night sky as they leave the bone-filled environment of death and entered a much more deserted area, which was none other than the desert, itself.
Rita screamed in horror, mostly because she now feels very frightened by the new dimension, the events that just occurred, and she was even feeling terrified of what these black dragons may do to her now that she is in one of their grasps.
"AAAHH! AH, AH, AAAAAAAHHH! HELP; SOMEBODY HELP ME" She screamed in terrible fear. "EGON, JENNY, OSCAR, UNCLE RAY, ANYBODY; GET ME OUT OF HHEEEEEERRRRREEEE!"
With that, the black dragons and Rita just flew farther away, disappearing into the dawning foggy sky.
Across the other side, back in the living human world, the Ghostbusters were back at headquarters mainly to find any reports of the escaped dragon from the museum; soon after the creature escaped it just instantaneously vanished into the city without a trace. The worst part is that Walter Peck is now involved with a new, yet unnamed, organization of his own that deals with similar situations as this, but only intends to expose them as fakes. Luckily, Peck hasn't found the creature since it escaped.
Now the Ghostbusters wait anxiously as they gathered around the recreational room of the second floor, listening to a police scanner. For the past hour so far, nothing had come up about the dragon sighting.
"Anything reported yet?" Egon asked as he came upstairs from the first floor.
"We're only picking up robberies and car chases at this time Egon," Elwood explained. "It's gonna take a little while longer than I thought."
"Well keep listening for any more information; I'm sure they'll be expecting a dragon sighting soon enough."
But so far, nothing like that had been heard.
While the 'busters still scan the police scanner for any hints of the whereabouts of the dragon, Jenny looked up and noticed Ray sitting on one of the beds in the bunk room. She wondered what was wrong, but then realized Ray was still feeling guilty of Rita's disappearance; so Jenny casually walked over to the bunk room and went inside.
Ray was sitting on Rita's bunk, slouched over in sadness, and was apparently holding something in his hands; it was actually a small plush wolf doll, the same one in which Ray, himself, had given to Rita when she was a child and she has kept it close ever since. Ray stared at the doll, remembering the good times he spent with Rita as he tries to raise her as his own; his eyes began to fill with tears and now felt he'll lose his only loving niece forever, trapped inside another world filled with horrors she may not ever handle on her own.
"I'm so sorry." A voice whispered from beside Ray.
Ray looked up and saw Jenny with a worried expression, standing next to him. Ray just stared at her for a moment, until he wiped off a teardrop from his cheek and then set his eyes back onto the doll, not replying a single word. But Jenny then sat beside Ray and started to try comforting him as she spoke once more.
"Ray, I'm truly sorry for what happened-"
"No, it wasn't your fault," Ray spoke at last. "… It was all mine; I should've taken her home when I had the chance, I was so willing to keep her safe with me, but now I'm losing her… and it's all my fault."
"Ray don't talk like that, of course it wasn't your fault."
"You don't understand, I promised her parents I would look after her; Rita's the only family I have now, I can't afford to lose her, I'll never forgive myself if I don't bring her back here. I didn't mean to be so overprotective of her; she's still a little girl to me, and she still has so much to learn."
"… She feels so much more like a daughter to you, isn't she?"
Ray stared at Jenny by her reply, but deeply believed it to be true.
"… As much as I feel like a real father to her…" He replied in agreement.
Jenny smirks as she explained. "It's okay to be protective of someone you love Ray, and you're doing a good job for it. I'm sure Rita's lucky to have you for an uncle, just as I'm lucky to have Winston Zeddemore as my father. You know, between you and me, if it was either myself or Joseph sucked into that portal instead of Rita, I believe daddy would do the same thing as you are right now."
Silence broke out once more for a moment.
"(Sigh) if there's one thing I've taught Rita," Ray spoke. "Is how there's nothing to be afraid of in this world. As I tried to rescue her from being sucked into that portal, I looked closely at Rita and realized… I was the one who's more frightened than Rita is; I'm more scared of what might be on the other side of that portal if I'm not there for her."
"I bet she's really scared now;" Jenny replied. "We'll bring her back, don't worry, then you and Rita could settle things down between the two of you."
Then Jenny stood to her feet and finally walked away from Ray, leaving the bunk room.
Ray continued to sit there, gazing upon Rita's plush wolf doll, and even shed a couple tears. He then finally set the doll onto the bed but then accidentally kicked something with the heel of his foot as he prepared to stand up. He looked down onto the floor and noticed a large notebook peeking from underneath the bed; so he picked it up and studied the book for a moment.
The front cover was just a plain black cover with small used scratches around most of it, so Ray opened it and saw the first title atop the first page of the large notebook. "Dragon Studies" was the entitlement, and surprisingly it was in Rita's handwriting; and underneath the title was a crudely drawn sketch of a simple Western European Dragon depiction, looking ferocious as ever.
At first, Ray didn't know what this notebook was all about, but had a feeling it definitely belonged to Rita. So he began to skim through the pages, seeing more sketches of different designs of different dragons of every culture in the world. Many of these pages even showed descriptive definitions that represent the dragon species; things like the sizes of these creatures, what powers they possess, their behaviors, weaknesses, flight speeds, almost everything.
Then as Ray turned the next page, he noticed a small advertisement of the Museum of Natural History taped to the page. It was a picture of a dragon's head on the front while the title underneath it said Dragons: Beyond the Imagination; it was actually an ad talking about the new exhibit held at the museum, later found out to be manifested and controlled by an inter-dimensional doorway. However, there was something written underneath the small piece of paper.
"Someday…" is what it said.
After reading through the first seventy pages of the notebook, Ray came to realize this notebook was actually an interest, Rita's very own interest. She was actually more enthusiastic about dragons, rather than just ghosts and apparitions; as Ray studied the taped advertisement once more, he softly spoke.
"Aw Rita, why didn't you just tell me?"
Then Ray looked over the pages once more; he skimmed through toward a page describing on what most species of dragons prefer to eat. He then read what Rita had written down.
"While in most popular cultures, dragons were described as vicious and nasty man-eaters; in most recent studies however, some species prefer to be either carnivorous, herbivorous, or even a little of both. Some species of dragons like to eat fruits, other animal types contain a diet that mostly consists of vegetables, most other variety prefer meat, and some of them like most sea dwellers for instance often love the taste of seafood instead…"
Then Ray developed an idea.
He quickly rushed over to a nearby fire pole, taking Rita's notebook with him, and finally slid down to enter the ground floor.
"… (Zzztt!)… Reports of an unidentified black monster have been spotted around Eastern Central Park…"
"Egon, we got it!" Elwood cried as he heard the police report a sighting through the police scanner.
"Awesome! Now let's go get that thing before Peck does!" Oscar replied with an excited tone.
"Yeah, about that…" Janine spoke as she just came from downstairs.
All the recruits, Egon, and Winston noticed Janine's presence, and they all now felt confused by her response.
"… Um… I just saw Dr. Stantz rushing over to Ecto-1, and he's already… taken a head start without you guys." She replied once more, also feeling confused.
Then, all the Ghostbusters cried at once with confusion. "What?!"
Upon arrival in Eastern Central Park, Ray drove down further and deeper into a darker portion of the park as he heard from the police scanner of Ecto-1 of a strange animal being spotted around the general area in which Ray is now parking at. With no one else in sight, Ray finally parked Ecto-1 and turned off her engines; he then picked up a fourteen-inch freshly caught fish in which he picked up from a nearby fish market, and then he got out of the vehicle to start looking around for the dragon. He took out his PKE meter from his utility belt and began to scan around the area, hoping to find any signal of the dragon's presence.
The meter level showed up nothing after the first few minutes, but Ray continued on, looking for the creature with the meter in one hand and the large fish held in the other. Everything was dead quiet after the next few minutes until…
SNAP!
A nearby sound of a tree branch breaking suddenly came from behind Ray!
Ray turned and held up the meter in place, but the contraption showed nothing in existence. So he looked around a little more, but alas found nothing in sight. Until, a small portion of the PKE rose, pointing at a large tree just ten feet from where Ecto-1 was parked, but just as Ray started to rush toward the tree, the meter decreased into nothing once again. So he heard some rustling sounds once more but there was nothing to be seen or picked up from the meter; the entire park became very quiet once again. Ray thought for sure he'd finally get the chance to see the creature again, but absolutely nothing was found once more.
Then as Ray placed the PKE meter back onto his utility belt, he began to hear some soft purring sounds coming from right behind him; he slowly turned his head and then he finally sees the same pair of green reptilian eyes from the museum, and this time they were within two feet toward him. It was none other than the black dragon from the museum!
It stood a couple feet away from Ray as it started to smell the fish Ray still carried in his hand. It tilted its head in confusion as it stared aimlessly at Ray as though wondering what Ray is doing with a large raw fish in the first place. Ray stared in awestruck at the creature as well, and he even began to feel the unusual warm and comforting feeling deep within him again. So he gently extends out the large fish toward the dragon, trying to make it come and take the bait.
So, the black dragon began to creep slowly toward Ray; it neared within inches and then studied the fish for a moment. It looked up at Ray but then it pulled back in fear, making a frightful growl.
"Whoa it's okay, I'm not gonna hurt you." Ray said, trying to calm the creature down. "It's alright; you're safe now. Go on, take the fish."
The creature calmed down by Ray's soft words; then it smelled the fish once more.
It opened its mouth slightly, looked up at Ray once more, and in a quick blink of an eye it finally snatched the fish right out of Ray's hands!
"Jeez!" Ray cried by the creature's snap.
The dragon chewed and swallowed the fish whole after one swipe from Ray's hands; it then licked its chops after that tasty meal but it then started to near itself closer to Ray. Ray backed himself up very quickly toward the side of Ecto-1, trying to keep his distance, until the dragon inched closer and it even began to smell Ray's scent, feeling as though he smelled very familiar to it. The creature snorted a little but tilts its head sideways in confusion, as well as it even felt the presence of Ray himself seemed to have given a warm feeling deep inside.
Both Ray and the dragon stared at each other for a long moment, both feeling very confused as well as they somehow felt strange yet comfortable feelings between the two. Then Ray finally but slowly reached out his hand toward the creature, but the dragon growled at first as it took a couple steps back away from Ray. Ray laid his hand down, until the creature stopped its growling and stared at Ray once more, not moving a muscle. Ray then closed his eyes, slowly held up his hand once more, and then he sat there motionless, waiting for something to happen.
The dragon stared at Ray's hand, not sure what to even do, until after a very long moment of silence it finally neared its nose… right onto Ray's hand.
As if he were touched by an angel, Ray opened his eyes to see the dragon softly purring as it now began to cuddle up against Ray's body. Something about this animal started to make Ray feel deeply warm, fuzzy, and comfortably well as the dragon snuggled closely onto his body, as if it were a familiar presence?
He began to pet the creature in comfort as he came to realize this dragon needs help, more than just a key resource into finding a new doorway to rescue Rita; in fact to Ray, this dragon could possibly be an inter-dimensional counterpart of the living plane… perhaps a possible representation… of Rita, herself?
Whatever the possibilities, all Ray needed to do now is to help take this dragon back to headquarters, and find a way to take it home to where it belongs.
"… I promise I'll take care of you…" He whispered possibly to the dragon.
The dragon softly purred in comfort.
Suddenly, sirens were heard across the other side of the park; policemen surrounded most of the park entrance and began to scramble around the area. They too received reports of the dragon sighting, until a large van appeared moments later and parked behind one of the cop cars. Its side doors opened and out came Walter Peck, looking mischievous as ever.
Ray heard the sirens and then began to act fast; the dragon heard the noises as well but started to back away in fear until Ray calmed it down with a soft voice and kept his hand onto its head. "No it's okay, those guys aren't with me; I swear it."
The dragon softly purred.
"Come on, I'm getting you out of here." Ray said once more.
So Ray rushed over toward the back side of Ecto-1 and opened the back door; the black dragon followed behind to see what Ray was doing until it heard voices coming at least within a hundred or so feet from behind. Ray looked over at the creature and studied its expressions; the dragon snarled at the mysterious voices until Ray realized the police were coming.
"Get inside, hurry!" Ray said as he grabbed the dragon softly by its head. "Come on!"
The dragon responded as it started to climb into the small capacity of Ecto-1. Despite the tight space on the size of the creature, it was able to fit through until its head loomed right over the front seats of the vehicle. Ray was able to get the dragon's body inside, but had a little trouble getting its tail inside as well. So he picked up the creature's tail and tries to stuff it into the compartment without even trying to harm the animal, itself. Over a couple minutes later, Ray finally got the entire dragon inside Ecto-1; he closed the back door with a tight squeeze and then finally boards in through the driver's side.
Ray started up the car's engine, which then made the dragon purr in fear, but Ray calmed it down as he set the car into gear.
"It's okay; we're getting out of here right now." Ray said, calming the dragon. "Just try to relax and keep your head down."
Then Ray stomped onto the gas pedal and the car took off at the starting speed of twenty-five mph. Ray quickly made a sharp U-turn around the park and quickly accelerated toward the park exit, which was still blocked by policemen.
Peck and a few of the cops entered the park but then noticed Ecto-1 coming right toward their location! Ecto-1 accelerated at a faster speed; then as she neared within a couple feet close toward Peck, all the cops and Peck quickly jumped out of the way as Ecto-1 drove right by in a flash. Peck watched as Ecto-1 made a quick jump over through the park exit as she drove by; her siren echoed in the air, warning the crowds of policemen to get out of the way, all this happening in one quick second.
Ecto-1 landed onto the empty pavement of the road and quickly turned right, and then left, driving down through South Canal. Ray and the black dragon finally escaped.
As he witnessed the escaping event, Peck realized that he was once again beaten by the Ghostbusters. "Damn you Ghostbusters!"
On their way back to headquarters, Ray sighed in relief as he felt deeply good on how the plan worked; and now he felt much more relieved in having the black dragon by his side. The dragon growled softly with a joyous expression, and then it unexpectedly licked Ray's face like it was a happy dog.
"Aw G- come on, not while I'm driving!" Ray said as he wiped his face with the sleeve of his uniform.
But the dragon just purred with a gleeful expression.
Ray looked at the creature in the eyes, and started to feel the same warm, fuzzy, and comfortable feeling deep inside once again. He smiled as he pet the dragon once more, speaking softly to it. "Well, you're safe now; and I swear, I'll never let you out of my sight."
The dragon purred once more. Then it snuggled its head up against Ray's shoulder and began to close its eyes to sleep a little while Ray continued to drive Ecto-1. Ray felt a little confused as to why he feels so comfortable with this dragon, feeling this creature somehow acts so familiar to him.
He asked to himself with a soft voice. "… Why do I have this weird and familiar feeling… you are acting like someone I know?"
Back across the unknown dimensional plane, the seven black dragons continued to fly through the morning sky, a couple hours after escaping the ghastly events around the strange, unpleasant, bone-filled environment. One of the dragons, the pudgy green-eyed one, still carried Rita in both of its large arms tightly as it flew across the sky. Rita, speaking of which, had her face hidden deep within her arms and the dragon's chest as she was carried in the air; she felt more frightened than ever, too worried to even wonder what these dragons may do to her soon. Momentarily, she began to uncover her head for a moment to see what's going on. She looked up at first to find she was still in the arms of the beast, then she looked to one side and saw six more black dragons flying individually in the air, and one of them noticed her.
It had brown eyes in slit formation, muscularly fit, and had a small tuft of hair on the lower tip of its lower jaw, looking as if it were a goatee. The dragon stared suspiciously at Rita, though it didn't growl at her, however the sheer sight of the animal scared Rita instead, forcing her to cover her face back within her arms and up against the pudgy dragon's chest.
The green-eyed dragon looked down and noticed Rita became more frightened once again, but then actually started to hear her softly cry. Feeling Rita's fear, the dragon held Rita tighter in its arms and then purred in a soft and comforting tone, almost as if it were telling Rita that everything is going to be okay, and that she is safe.
Then, all seven of the dragons dove one hundred feet down as they came up to a large valley of mountains, looking as if it were New York City itself. They dived once more, entering through a section that looked as though it were the Tribeca area, following a route similar to West Broadway. Finally, the dragons arrived upon a large cave, almost the size of the Ghostbusters firehouse from the outside, and then the first six dragons flew and landed inside. It was a bit dark and empty; all the creatures walked in, feeling a bit tired after a long night's work of busting a large dragon specter and saving an unusual being from being eaten by it.
Moments after the first six dragons settled into their headquarters, the pudgy dragon was the last one to enter, still carrying Rita in its arms; then as it landed onto its hind legs, it gently placed Rita down to the ground and then stood on all four of its legs. Rita looked up as she found herself inside a dark cave filled with nests of the same black dragons that took her, and once more she felt completely scared. Then, a large wing covered over her, as a head looked down beside her; it was the pudgy dragon looming over Rita with its green eyes still in slit form, but didn't snarl at her or anything. Instead, it just softly growled at Rita, as though it were intending her to stay inside this cave where she can be safe with it and the others.
So then, the pudgy dragon walked away from Rita, leaving her in the middle of the cave. But then, as the dragon walker further toward an empty nest at the far left hand corridor, Rita finally calm herself down a bit and looked behind to see the cave opening. She then came to realize it was now her time to escape! Rita quickly sprang up to her feet and finally ran for her life!
Suddenly, the dragons noticed Rita fleeing toward the cave exit and began to roar, not in a ferocious manner, but more of fear. The pudgy dragon noticed Rita's escaping and then began to run, on all four legs, toward Rita.
Rita neared the one foot toward the exit, and just one second before she could finally escape, she suddenly trips over the ledge of the opening and falls six feet down toward another ledge of the mountain. The pudgy dragon meanwhile, looks out to see Rita was nowhere in sight, but at the same time its expression changes into a very worried look, as if it was truly frightened to see Rita gone. So the dragon takes of into the air to go in search of Rita, checking over the mountainsides for any presence.
Meanwhile, Rita laid unconscious for a quick moment until she awakens to find herself atop another ledge of the mountain, but instantly begins to climb down as fast as she could to escape the dragons' lair. Over twenty feet down, Rita comes across a small passageway, leading straight down nearly fifty feet toward the grassy ground; but, as she walks down carefully through the roadside, she was suddenly cornered by a group of more dragons. These certain species however, were very monstrous than the black dragons she faced; they were dark alien-like beings, with no wings, large eyes with no pupils, ragged spine frills, six small arms and legs, and tails with a small spiked bulb at the end. They were all very carnivorous as they surrounded Rita, frightening her with their very presence.
Scared, Rita pulls out her neutrona wand for defense and waits for the creatures to attack, and when the first small dragon jumps toward her, Rita fires her weapon and the blast of the proton stream pushes the animal to the side, knocking it down. The others prepare themselves to make their own attempts, but Rita fired as much of her weapon as possible to keep the creatures at bay, but there were too many of them; a couple of them already jumped on Rita and started to nibble on her uniform, proton pack, and everything.
Rita tries to fight off the little monsters off of her until a large fireball appears from nowhere and hit's the ground, within a few feet of Rita, with the force of the blast pushing both her and the creatures up toward the side of the mountain. The blast instantaneously scares off the small dragon fiends, with only a handful of them returning to finish off their hunt.
Then, Rita was quickly grabbed by the collar of her uniform by none other than the pudgy dragon; it held onto her tightly with its mouth as it finally picks her up into the air, away from the small dragon beasts. Higher up back atop the mountainside, it took Rita back inside the top mountain cave where the other black dragons sat in waiting, but at the same time Rita screamed in fear, not knowing what the dragon is going to do next.
"AAAAAHH! OKAY, OKAY, I-I WON'T DO IT AGAIN!" She cried.
The pudgy dragon took Rita over toward a large, half carved boulder and set her up against the smooth flat area of it. It then placed one of its massive, paw-like talons up against Rita's shoulder, covering her entire shoulder and half of her upper left chest, and it stared at her with those large green eyes, looking either disturbed or disappointed. Rita couldn't help it, she was so frightened out of her wits by everything she had went through in one day; she was sucked into a strange doorway that led her into an unknown universe that's somewhat populated with dragons, almost eaten by a ghostly figure that was the size of an elephant and a half, and ended up into a large cave with six other black dragons and is now being held hostage by the same dragon that's holding her now. All Rita felt she could do now is to meet her maker.
She started to shed one frightful tear as she continued to stare at the pudgy dragon, eye to eye, until she spoke. "Okay, I'm sorry; I-I'm sorry! I won't run again, j-just- p-p-please don't EAT me!"
The dragon didn't even move a muscle, it looked closely into Rita's eyes; it saw not just fear, or the tears she was crying, but it mostly saw something more. It began to feel a strange, yet warm feeling deep inside; somehow it felt there was something so familiar about Rita, as if she were a… familiar presence?
The creature's pupils slowly became round, indicating it was not going to hurt Rita; in fact, this dragon felt it was never going to hurt Rita at all, rather… protect her? Slowly, the beast's paw began to turn sideways, up toward Rita's face like it were a hand preparing to gently touch a frightened child's face in comfort; and Rita was the frightened child.
The dragon touched Rita's face very softly, letting her know it meant her no harm at all. Rita looked up at the dragon, despite she still felt very scared, but then finally noticed the innocence in its eyes. The dragon purred very softly to Rita, as though it were telling her it will never hurt her, how she is safe, and that it promises to take care of her. Rita finally calmed down a little as the dragon finally lowered its paw to the ground. Then, it walked over to its left side and finally laid itself down onto a large nest for it to sleep in; it kept its head perked up as it stared at Rita, keeping its own eyes on her, letting her know it will always watch over her.
Rita stared at the dragon once more for a very long moment, until she looked away and started to unbuckle her proton pack and took off her Ectogoggles. She sat there in grief, somehow realizing she may never actually go back home, back to New York, back to the Ghostbusters firehouse, or even go back… into Ray's arms… ever again.
Uncle Ray.
Rita may never ever see him again, even after what she had said to him; she didn't mean to, she didn't know. He was only trying to protect her, from things like this. He only wanted to do what was right for her, and Rita didn't even see it.
So Rita cried softly once more, until she started to reach into her uniform pocket and pulled out a photograph. She took one long, momentous look at the picture; it was recently taken around one time when Ray took Rita up to Coney Island, to bring back the days when he and Rita would always be together no matter what. It showed Ray with his arms wrapped tightly around Rita as she wrapped her arms around her uncle. Both of them were smiling with joy, happy to be together.
… But not this time.
"… (Sniff) You were right… you were right…" Rita said softly with heavy tears.
As Rita cried more, she began to hear a low purr from right beside her. She looked up and saw the pudgy dragon once again standing beside her; somehow it couldn't help but hear Rita crying. It looked at the picture Rita held in her hands and then started to give a slight worried purr, but then Rita placed the photo back into her pocket and just sat there like nothing happened. The dragon, however, studied Rita's behavior and then realized she was homesick; as well as it felt Rita's presence somehow made it feel warm inside, like it knew a presence similar to Rita's. So, the dragon then gave an admiring smile and then lowered its head behind Rita's neck and started to grab hold of Rita's uniform collar once more with its jaw.
Gently this time, the dragon picked up Rita from the ground and carried her up like a female lion carrying her cub.
"W-What're you doing?!" Rita said, feeling nervous once more.
The dragon carried Rita by the collar and took her ten feet to its nest, where it gently set her down to the nest and finally laid itself beside her. It wrapped one of its large arms around Rita, letting her lay across it, and then it just stared upon her; a hint of a smile was seen on the creature's face, and its eyes were halfway closed, looking as if it were an admiring expression.
As Rita studied the animal's feature, she began to realize this dragon really is being protective, and at the same time she somehow felt she actually recognizes most of the dragon's personality, looking as if the dragon seemed very familiar to her.
The dragon purred softly to Rita, as though telling her it will never let go, and it promises it'll take care of her until she is safely returned home. Then it laid its head down to rest.
Rita somehow began to feel a familiar presence through her, and somewhat realized who it might be.
"… I know this might sound crazy," She asked possibly to the dragon. "… but why do I feel… like I already know you?"