After one long climb to the twenty second story, we finally reached the roof. "Why…couldn't…we…have taken…the elevator?" I panted.

"It's not a very safe idea; the building might collapse," Egon replied.

"Besides, the power's been shut off," added Ray.

I rolled my eyes. Scientists.

The sky was even more ominous at the top. Lightning cracked and thunder roared. I shuddered. I was scared shitless.

We stared at a beautiful woman in an orange dress and a nerdy looking man. They were standing on either side of a large concrete platform. The possessed tenants raised their arms toward the sky, and large bolts of lightning struck them.

"Dana! Dana!" yelled Peter. We watched in horror as the lightning seemed to transform the two into huge, disgusting canine-like beasts. The one had been Dana Barrett turned its head toward us and growled menacingly.

Peter turned to Ray. "Okay. So…she's a dog."

Jerk that he was, my heart bled a little for Pete. I knew that deep down, he had really loved Dana.

The dogs galloped over to the large fortress and stood at attention. The fortress, in a way, was beautiful and frightening all at the same time.

Suddenly, the doors swung open, emitting a light we all had to shield our eyes from. A figure stepped out. We stared at it in awe.

"It's a girl," said Ray, a little surprised.

The terrifying woman stepped over to one of the dogs and scratched on the head, almost lovingly. She had shortly clipped brown hair and red eyes. Real cover of Vogue material.

"It's Gozer," Egon said.

Winston looked over him. "I thought Gozer was a man."

"It's whatever it wants to be," Egon replied.

The feminist in me was a little offended at their surprise that a Sumerian god could take the form of a woman. But I had to admit, it wasn't exactly I had been expecting either.

"Well, whatever it is, it's gotta get by us!" shouted Peter. He paused. "Go get her, Ray!"

We all stared at him. "What?" Peter said innocently.

Ray sighed and stepped a little closer to the demonic woman. "Be careful," I whispered under my breath.

"Gozer the Gozerian!" shouted Ray. The she-demon turned to him.

"Good evening," Ray continued. "As a duly designated representative of the city, county, and state of New York, I order you to cease any and all supernatural activity and return forthwith to your place of origin, or to the nearest convenient parallel dimension!"

"That outta do it, thanks very much Ray!" Peter called.

Gozer spoke for the first time. "Are you a god?"

I gasped. That was it. The raspy voice I'd heard in my dreams.

This was my nightmare.

Ray looked back at Peter, waiting for confirmation to answer. Peter shrugged. Ray looked back at Gozer. "Uh…no?"

"Then…die!" Bolts of lightning flew out Gozer's fingertips.

The impact of the electricity nearly blew us off the building. We quickly picked ourselves up. "Ray. If someone asks you if you're a god, you say yes!" exclaimed Winston.

"Alright," said Peter. "This chick is toast!"

We pulled out our wands and prepared to blast the demon. "Let's show this prehistoric bitch how we do things downtown," declared Peter.

Gozer hissed at us in a sinister way.

"Throw it!" Peter yelled.

We let fly the streams. Gozer jumped out of the way and performed an acrobatic jump into the air, landing on the large platform. "Nimble little minx, isn't she?" Peter remarked.

"We'd better go full stream," said Egon.

We all nodded and turned up the power. "Let's blow this mother back to the hellhole she came from!" I declared.

"Aim for the flattop!" yelled Ray.

We fired at the vixen. She vanished like a puff of smoke. "Wasn't so hard," bragged Pete casually.

"We neutronized it!" exclaimed Ray. "Do you know what this means? A complete particle reversal!"

Winston grinned. "Alright, we had the tools; we had the talent!"

"It's Miller time!" Peter put his hand in the middle, and Ray and Winston followed suit.

I was about to start join the celebrating when I felt a cold feeling. And Gozer's voice came back to me: It is coming. It will destroy.

"Uh, guys?" I called nervously. "I don't know…something's off."

Egon stared at me a second curiously. He whipped out his PKE meter and studied it. "Ray, this looks extraordinarily bad."

Suddenly the building began to shake under our feet. A chunk of the building broke off and fell toward us. "Look out!" yelled Egon.

I gasped and jumped out of the way just in the nick of time as the fragment fell and bounced over the side.

Sub-creatures! Gozer's voice rasped, seeming to come out of nowhere. Gozer the Gozerian, Gozer the Destructor, Volguus Zildrohaar the Traveler has come! Choose and perish.

"What do you mean 'choose'?" yelled Ray. "We don't understand!"

Choose. Choose the form of the Destructor.

"I get it!" shouted Peter. "I get it! Oh, very cute!"

The rest of us stared at him, questioningly.

"Whatever we think of," Peter explained. "If we think of J. Edgar Hoover, J. Edgar Hoover will appear and destroy us. So don't think of anything! Empty your heads! We've only got one shot at this!"

I closed my eyes and tried to think about nothing. Trust me; it's harder than it sounds.

The choice is made.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Peter yelled at the disembodied voice. "Nobody chose anything!" He looked at Egon. "Did you choose anything?"

"No!" Egon replied.

Peter turned to Winston. "Did you?"

"My mind was totally blank!"

"It wasn't me! I swear!" I added.

"Well I didn't choose anything!" exclaimed Peter. That's when we realized that Ray was unusually quiet.

We all turned to look at him. "I couldn't help it," he squeaked. "It just popped in there."

"What, Ray? What just popped in there?" said Peter in a deadly calm voice.

"I…I tried to think-"

"Look!" shouted Egon, pointing out into the distance.

"Oh, shit!" exclaimed Winston.

Something large, and I'm talking over a hundred feet, and white bobbed between the tops of the buildings. We all ran over to the edge, trying to get a better glimpse at Ray's creature.

"What did you do, Ray?" exclaimed Peter.

Ray gulped as he stared at his beast. "It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man."

"Oh my God," I whispered.

The confection of evil tromped down the boulevard, with chaos in his wake. The people below ran for their lives. It was sad, in a way. With his jaunty little sailor's and collar, and the big dumb grin on his face, he almost seemed lovable. If only he weren't so gigantic.

"Well, there's something you don't see everyday," Peter mused.

"I tried to think of the most harmless thing," said Ray. "Something I loved from my childhood…something that could never ever possibly destroy us: Mr. Stay-Puft."

"Nice thinking, Ray," said Peter sarcastically.

I used to roast Stay-Puft marshmallows by the fire at Camp Wauconda." He shook his head, scared to death at what he had brought about.

Peter looked over Egon. "Ray has gone bye-bye, Egon. What do you have left?"

Egon, like the rest of us, was petrified with fear. "Sorry, Venkman. I'm terrified beyond the capacity for rational thought."

Peter sighed. "Alright. Winston, Jennifer? You guys got anything?"

"Hey, I only work here," was Winston's excuse.

Suddenly, the marshmallow looked our direction. The usual jolly face I'd seen countless times on the Stay-Puft Marshmallows bag had now been twisted into an evil leer.

"Oh no!" Winston gasped.

"Mother pus bucket!" declared Peter.

I gulped and thought fast. "Well…if he's a marshmallow…maybe we should roast him!"

"Aw, do we have to?" said Ray wistfully.

Suddenly, there was a loud crash as the United Eastern Orthodox Cathedral became Mr. Stay-Puft's personal stepstool.

Peter became enraged. "Nobody steps on a church in my town!"

"One, two, three, roast him!" yelled Ray.

We fired at the marshmallow man. He groaned in agony, but that didn't stop him from scaling the side of the building. Flames climbed up the walls, and we all ducked to steer clear of them.

"Funny us going out like this; killed by a hundred-foot marshmallow man," Ray said.

"We've been going about this all wrong," said Peter. "This Mr. Stay-Puft is okay. He's a sailor, he's in New York. We get this guy laid and we won't have any trouble!"

"Ugh!" I groaned. "If only we could close that damn door! Then I bet Gozer would disappear!"

Egon gasped. "That's it!"

I was confused. "Close the door? You mean it's that simple?"

"Well, not exactly," said Egon. "I have a radical idea. The door swings both ways. We could reverse the particle flow through the gate."

"How?" said Ray.

Egon thought for a moment. "We'll cross the streams."

"Uh, excuse me, Egon," Peter interceded. "I thought you said crossing the streams was bad."

"Cross the streams…" Ray and I whispered, considering the option. It had possibilities…but consequences as well.

"You're gonna endanger us," Pete continued. "You're gonna endanger our client-the nice lady who paid us in advance before she became a dog."

"Not necessarily," Egon said quickly. "There's definitely a very slim chance we'll survive." He looked back and forth to the rest of us.

I gulped. "Well, I'm all for it."

Ray nodded. "Me, too."

Egon looked at Peter, hoping for the okay.

"I love this plan. I'm excited to be a part of it! Let's do it!" Peter exclaimed.

Winston shook his head, knowing it was the end. "This job is definitely not worth eleven-five a year!"

We dashed back over the temple, Ray narrowly missing the blazing hand of Mr. Stay-Puft, as he reached over the side.

We pulled out our sticks, ready for the attack. Peter turned to Ray. "See you on the other side, Ray."

Ray smiled. "It's been a pleasure working with you, Dr. Venkman."

The two best friends, with brave grins on their faces lit their wands. I gasped. They were saying their farewells for the last time.

There was something I had to do before we were blown to smithereens.

"Peter!" I yelled above the roar of the packs. "I'm sorry!"

He looked over at me. "Me too, kid."

I nodded and continued. "I love you all!" I shouted to the four of them. "You guys are like brothers to me!"

"We love you too, Jennifer."

It was at that moment that I really knew we weren't going to make it out of this. Because it wasn't Ray or Peter or Winston who had replied. It had been the standoffish one, the shy one, the one whom you couldn't make conversation with easily. Only in a moment grave peril would Egon Spengler ever admit to having human emotions.

Time seemed to freeze for a second.

I stared at all of them, all of my brothers. Each and every one of them was special to me.

Peter had been the one who led me to our team. I'd always be grateful for that. Yes, he could be a jackass at times, and yes, he tried to seduce me through science and lied to me about being psychic. But I could never hate him, because I knew deep down, he was a good man.

Then there was Ray. He was so optimistic and warm. From the very beginning, he'd accepted me. I would never stop marveling at his fervent belief in the good of humanity and general love for everyone. And while at times, he seemed rather unintelligent, he was one of the two most brilliant people I'd ever met.

The other, of course, was Egon. He was an intellectual man with an undying passion for science. He had a massive sweet tooth which I could totally respect. He was understanding and occasionally humorous. He may not have had the most developed social skills, but he was a good friend and confidante.

I regretted that I had never taken the time to connect with Winston, our rookie. He didn't have the same understanding of physics and parapsychology like the others, but he was still smart as the rest of them. He always managed to keep his cool under pressure and the Ghostbusters would incomplete with him.

Together, we formed a true family. The family I never really had back home.

I knew it wasn't likely that we would live through this. But I could go back and do it over, I wouldn't change a thing. I would die a thousand times alongside these men.

I blinked back a tear. I then realized why my eyes had always been stinging in my nightmares: because I was crying.

"Turn 'em on!" cried Ray. I gulped and hit the switch. I brought the end of my wand to touch the others. The five combined streams formed one super-beam that exploded the temple. I felt a tug on my arm as I was yanked out of the way.

Then, everything went silent.