Chapter 5: Legacy of Cedar Mountain

"The heavens roared and the earth rumbled; then it became deathly still, and darkness loomed. A bolt of lightning cracked and a fire broke out, and where it kept thickening, there rained death. Then the white-hot name dimmed, and the fire went out, and everything that had been falling around turned to ash." -- Gilgamesh's third dream, 'The Epic of Gilgamesh.'

"...By the time we managed to get our hands on a helicopter, we were losing the light," Winston sighed wearily. "And when we did get up there, there wasn't anything strange that we could see. Not even strong wind." He paused and a grim expression settled across his features. "Except for the six dead bodies, of course."

"They're definitely dead?" Janine asked in a subdued tone as she set a tray of coffee on the table in front of the three Ghostbusters. Picking up one mug, she sank down on the sofa next to Egon but her attention was on Winston.

"Oh yeah," the Ghostbusters' resident mechanic winced painfully at the memory. "They were laid out near the cedar trees alright and..." he hesitated and gave Peter a sharp look. He had already spoken to the psychologist about what they had seen, worried about how Ray was handling it. The weirdness of fighting spooks on a daily basis was completely different to coming face to face with death and the sight in the garden had been extremely unpleasant. Although Winston had experience at coping with such scenes, it had been a long time ago and dredged up memories he wasn't keen to dwell on. Peter had agreed to keep his eye on Ray and admitted he would be watching Winston closely as well. Winston hadn't expected anything different.

Now, understanding Winston's dilemma, Peter didn't actually react to it. Winston hadn't given the full detail to Peter either and the psychologist didn't want to influence how Winston approached the subject. Psychologist or not, Peter had no more personal experience with this kind of thing than the rest of the his colleagues and was therefore prepared to trust Winston's instincts on this subject.

With a sigh, the ex-soldier shrugged. "Well, they were definitely burned. I... I think they'll have trouble identifying some of them," he gave his audience a significant stare and Janine paled immediately. Egon didn't react noticeably but Peter shifted uncomfortably and nodded quickly for Winston to continue. "They had also been stabbed, I think. The wounds were hard to see but there was so much blood..."

"Were there any weapons that could have caused the wounds?" Peter asked grimly.

Winston shook his head. "Not that I could see but I don't think we're going to find any. They were... twisted." He swallowed. "Like they had been... hanged on a washing line. There was blood on the trees, on their branches..." he gave Janine a sharp look. Able to stare down showers of frogs, face ghosts, demons and transdimensional dangers, it was clear the secretary had found the line she couldn't cross. She was looking pale enough for him to fear she might faint. "Janine, are you alright?" he asked, the concern in his voice making both of his male colleagues turn to look at her.

She nodded vaguely in response, her eyes glazed. Egon abruptly leaned across and carefully prised the coffee out of her hands before her suddenly nerveless fingers could spill the hot liquid.

"I think we get the point, Winston." Egon's tone was irritated as he wrapped an arm around the secretary. She was trembling slightly but her face was composed into an iron mask, an expression that only succeeded in making her ashen features look haunted.

He swallowed. "Yeah. Sorry Janine, I wasn't trying to upset you."

"It's okay, Winston," she replied weakly, gratefully curling up against the physicist. The fact that it was Egon offering her a refuge wasn't important to her right now. What she wanted was something warm, reassuring and alive that she could use as a physical barrier against the pictures her imagination was creating, something any of the men in the room would have willingly given her had they been sat on the couch instead of Egon. "I can cope with blood but..."

"Yeah," Winston agreed tersely. She didn't need to explain. He had seen the bodies after all. He forced himself to focus on the task at hand. "Anyway, like I said, everything looked normal - even the cedar trees. I tried to get another P.K.E. reading with my meter but we turned it off when it started smoking." He put the meter in question on the table but for once Egon didn't move to pick it up. With Janine currently curled up against him, it was his injured hand that was the only one free. Unfortunately, his injured hand was also his dominant hand, which meant his ability to write, work on the equipment or conduct experiments in the near future was impaired far more than he was willing to tolerate.

As if not trusting the physicist's ability to avoid playing with idle P.K.E. meters, Peter leaned forward and quickly picked it up, looking at the readings that Winston had succeeded in saving.

"We managed to get as low as a hundred feet before the pilot was forced to abort," Winston continued. "The winds picked up suddenly at around that height, although you really can't see them until you hit them. It looks like the whole garden is surrounded by this wind barrier but it just doesn't seem to be doing anything except preventing us from getting inside. Ray and I tried to use our proton packs on the barrier but there was no noticeable effect. There's also no noticeable source for the barrier. If it's the cedar trees, you can't tell just by looking. Ray looked with his ecto-goggles and said the cedar trees do show up but they're hard to read because the psychokinetic force of the wind shield interferes with the readings."

"Hm." Egon mused.

"Speaking of Tex..." Peter stretched and looked around. "Has he actually found anything yet or should we go rescue him from the library?"

Because Peter and Egon had been at the hospital longer than either had planned to be, Ray and Winston had been forced to accept a lift from Professor Birkenall in order to get home. Janine had stayed behind after-hours as well so she could find out how badly Egon had been hurt. It had passed 7pm when Ecto-1 had finally pulled up in the garage and its two tired, hungry occupants had tumbled out. In that time, Ray had locked himself up in the library, reading everything he could lay his hands on about haunted forests, interrupted only once when Winston had come to fill him in on what Nasim had told Peter and Egon. Winston had spent the time cleaning the equipment and ensuring it was in peak condition, setting aside anything that was defective or functioning below par to sort out later. His gut - backed up by the sight of those six dead people - told him this was going to be a rough job and he wanted to make sure their equipment didn't fail them when they needed it most.

"He was still reading the last time I checked," Janine sighed, running a hand through her hair which was beginning to look a little tousled.

"I'll go find him," Winston rose but stopped as Ray walked into the room. The occultist had the bleary-eyed appearance of a man who had spent too long straining his eyes in poor lighting conditions. He stifled a yawn as he collapsed in a seat and grabbed one of the mugs of coffee Janine had provided.

"How's the hand?" he asked Egon, spotting the dressing.

"Sensitive." Egon replied shortly, clearly not wanting to discuss it.

Ray's eyes narrowed. "Janine, you look terrible."

"Winston told us about the..." she said slowly.

"Oh!" Ray's face paled noticeably. He swallowed. "Yeah. Are you going to be okay?"

She smiled wanly. "Are you going to be okay, Ray?"

The engineer nodded, perhaps a little too quickly. "Fine." His eyes shied away from the penetrating stare Peter suddenly shot him then snapped back to glare at his friend. Peter grinned shamelessly at him, wresting a tiny, rueful smile from Ray.

"Did you find anything?" Egon asked, smoothly moving the subject away from his injury or the fate of the six people in the garden.

A more genuine smile flitted across his face this time. "Oh yeah!" he confirmed. "I found plenty thanks to the information Mr. Jabbaar gave us." He leaned forward and put his mug down, expression becoming more serious. "Guys, this is big. After hearing what he said about where the trees came from, I limited my search to haunted forests of that region. I didn't find much, until I stopped looking for ghosts and started looking for demons and gods..."

"...Oh great. That's just great..." Winston muttered.

"Yeah." Ray agreed. "Anyway, that's when I found out that in Babylonian times, the Forest of Cedars was the home of the ancient gods. Their king was Enlil, the Lord of Winds, and he created the Lord of Cedars to protect their home from humans. I'm not entirely sure if he's a demi-god or a demon-god, but what is known is that he's a fire-breathing giant with poisonous breath. He had the teeth of a dragon or lion, was covered in horny scales, had a snake's head for a tail and the feet and claws of a vulture..."

"So, the kind you don't want to take to parties then?" Peter asked blandly.

"His name was Humbaba or Hawawa and, basically, he ruled the Forest of Cedars until two humans who were blessed by another god killed him and cut down all the trees in the forest. One of the humans, Enkidu, had known Humbaba and betrayed him. When Humbaba submitted and offered to make a deal to allow humans to cut down the cedars without incurring his wrath, Enkidu told his allies to not believe Humbaba and kill him. For this betrayal, Enkidu died a painful and slow death and, for the destruction of the forests, humanity was cursed by the gods. Since then, the land has become haunted and, as the trees have been cut down, the land has become barren and dry. Scientists say the land is suffering because the ecological role of trees in soil health and fertility has been destroyed but the locals whisper of demons and ghosts bound to continue the curse called down upon mankind for walking into the home of the gods and destroying its guardian."

"Great. So how does this tie in to our cedars?" Winston asked.

"Oh, that's the best bit!" Ray told him. "The greatest of the trees stood as the entrance to the Forest of Cedars and when Humbaba was cast down, the remains of this tree became the focus for the curse. I think all trees descended from this one have carried the curse. As long as the tree was treated well, the curse wouldn't be activated but any kind of upheaval or abuse and the curse would awaken and unleash the ancient god that's bound to it. The cedar trees must be part of the legacy of this tree. When they were uprooted from their homeland three years ago, the curse must have been activated, awakening the god. But by putting them into native soil, Mr. Jabbaar must have been able to fool the entity into believing it was home... somehow," he frowned slightly, as if a little confused by something. "Now the botanists have repotted the trees, the demon isn't fooled anymore and is waking up to enact his vengeance against humanity for cutting down his forest."

"Didn't those two botanists say the cedar is very rare?" Peter asked Egon.

"Yes," the physicist confirmed. Like Ray, he was frowning as if turning over a puzzle in his mind.

"That's gonna be one mad demon when he wakes up then." Winston sighed.

Ray was nodding. "Basically, what we're dealing with is a very ancient and very powerful god of the forest. And he's waking up in the middle of a city."

Peter buried his head his hands. "Ray, tell me there's a way to defeat this guy?"

Before Ray could answer, Egon cocked an eyebrow at him. "Ray, you said this god is a fire-breathing giant?"

"He sure is. Pretty mean-tempered one too."

"Then we can assume that is how the people in the garden died. The essence of Humbaba lies within the two cedar trees and can probably manipulate fire." He glanced downwards as he felt Janine flinch against him but she didn't say anything.

"Sounds reasonable." Ray agreed. "What's the problem, Egon?"

The physicist shifted slightly. "How can he make the wind barrier? Western traditions have been inherited from ancient Sumerian and Babylonian philosophy - Air and Fire oppose each other. How could he command both?"

Ray paused, mouth hanging open slightly as he thought about it. "Well, he was created and empowered by Enlil, the Lord of Winds, to protect the cedar forest and he's obviously been changed by the curse. Wind is his gift, fire his natural power."

Winston was frowning. "So what you're saying is that we can't stop the wind barrier without taking on the demon in the trees? But we can't reach the trees without busting the barrier?"

"Well, under normal circumstances, our particle throwers don't pack enough power to take on something this powerful but if we readjust our frequencies and set the streams to full power, all four concentrated at the same spot should work. Right, Egon?" He looked hopefully at the physicist.

"It's an ordinary psychokinetic manifestation of extraordinarily concentrated strength," Egon was still looking distracted. "Our equipment is designed to confront this type of energy but not at this level of power."

"Right, so we soup up the packs and kick ass then!" Peter was suddenly looking much happier. "How long will it take to fix them up?"

"Not long at all, Peter," Ray said, some of his old enthusiasm finally creeping back into his demeanour. "Just a few modifications. Egon, Winston and I could all have them done in no time at all."

"There is one problem," Egon mused thoughtfully.

"I knew it," Winston sighed to Peter.

Peter scowled. "Yeah, I know the problem. Egon's not going to be playing mad scientist until that hand heals."

Egon shot Peter an irritated glare. "The problem, Peter, is that we have to do this as soon as possible. If we allow him to awaken, his power will be beyond anything we are capable of dealing with. If Ray is right about his motivation then, if he does wake up, he will not be satisfied with simply destroying New York. He will go wherever civilisation takes him."

"You mean our packs, which may or may not have the power to destroy this wind barrier, let alone the tree god, are the only things standing between us and Armageddon?" Winston asked.

"Yes."

Winston shook his head. "No pressure," he sighed and slumped.