The hallway resembled a dungeon from the Dark Ages... What little of it Janine could see anyway. It was nearly pitch-dark, extremely humid, and the acrid stench of tissue decay hung in the air. The female cenobite seemed to know where to go on instinct. Every once in a while they would pass small slices of light. Then the terrified secretary could make out murals on the wall of all sorts of nasty stone carvings. Incubi, succubae, horrible torture scenes; it was all there. The hell bound artwork, the darkness, and the screaming laments that seemed simultaneously painful and hopeless made Janine wonder if she would ever see the sun or her friends again.
As the grisly demon dragged Janine through an open corridor, she could see in the distance in the air a gigantic diamond with the same mystical pattern as the box. There seemed to be purple light emanating from both sides of the prism, as if powering the horrible dimension like a battery. Beneath, Janine spied some demons sanding the skin off some poor soul--while he was alive and screaming. She immediately had to look away; she feared that the same fate awaited her around the next corner.
Pretty soon they came into the area with the prison cells. Again, it was dark, wet, and smelly, only this time the light slivers were bright red and seemed to emanate from above each prisoner. Some of them would poke their heads out from between the bars and scream or roar at her. Many of them were tattooed with numerous deep cuts, or in some cases, were missing certain organs via festering bloody wounds.
Great. There go eight-hundred dollars' worth of shrink visits, thought Janine to herself.
Soon she passed a cell in which the prisoner startled her. She recognized him from stories that the Ghostbusters had told her. The long cream-colored hair draped evenly on the shoulders. The sunken red eyes paid her just a glance. The rat-like ears didn't even respond. Granted, where once stood the body of a proud, brutal warrior was now a shriveled old man. But the medieval attire and wide forehead were unmistakable. Vigo von Homburg, the demonic Carpathian wizard, was in Hell.
Then the ugly cenobite suddenly stopped, and opened up an empty cell. With unnatural strength she proceeded to tie Janine to this strange looking throne. It had many of the same patterns as the awful murals on the walls. However, it had metal straps to hold her down: one across the neck, two per arm, and a full chastity belt around the waist. The cenobite rather violently tied her down in these things and positioned a monitor enveloped in brain matter in front of her, and elongated metallic cutting devices directly above her head. Fortunately they weren't spinning or advancing on her position, but she figured that sooner or later they would be. Since the monitor was a fair distance from her face, Janine had a chance to watch what the evil magician was doing through the gaps between bars on the cell door.
Scattered around Vigo were various magical artifacts, bloody animal bones, skins and organs, and framed pictures of a WWI British military officer, a strange robed lady, a zoot-suited wiseguy from what Janine guessed were the 1930s, and a Celtic sage. The pictures were all attached to a candelabrum, with each candle lit. He also had this book, from which he was chanting, "Ia Ia Ia Ia Sakkakth! Iak Sakkakh! Ia Shia Xul..." Every so often the ancient dusty tome would levitate in a circle and the candles would flare up. Vigo looked like a man possessed; like a mad scientist about to unveil his greatest experiment...
…
With an ear-splitting screech Ray's car pulled up in front of the firehouse. Louis and Ray busted out of the small red Civic and nearly tore off the firehouse doors trying to enter. Dr. Peter Venkman was in his pseudo-office rearranging his desk and was the first to hear the two agitated men.
"What's the matter?" asked Venkman. "Did you accidentally set the bookstore on fire again?"
Ray seemed to rapid-fire the words right out of his mouth: "No, Pete, it's a lot worse than that. Strange demons came and they took Janine and demolished my bookstore and nearly got Louis!! Some of the strangest PKE readings I ever saw came from them! They were all ugly and bloody and mutilated and not like the normal run-of-the-mill spooks..."
Peter responded: "Ray, just slow down. Now are those weird creatures..."
"Cenobites," corrected Louis.
"Ceno-what?" came a voice from the stairs. Dr. Egon Spengler had overheard the conversation.
"Okay," retried Peter. "These Cenobites kidnapped Janine. Where did they take her?"
"Down a long dark hallway that opened up right in the middle of her apartment," exclaimed Louis. "She bought me this neat-looking puzzle box for my birthday and we tried working with it after dinner. Pretty soon it started to move on its own and it locked into a diamond-shaped pattern. That's when the wall opened up and the Cenobites took her."
"Ray, can you tell us anything else about it?" asked Peter.
"Well, I was just about to shelve a new edition of Magicians, Martyrs, and Madmen when Louis came charging into the shop completely out of breath. Not long after, the outside wall blew open and two of those Cenobites came to try to get him. Thankfully there were no other people in my shop at the time..."
"There's a shocker," retorted Peter.
"...I grabbed the PKE meter from underneath the counter and powered it up. We were able to confuse them and bury them in books long enough to get away. They seemed hell-bent on capturing Louis and didn't pay much attention to me at all. That's probably why the escape plan worked."
"Why don't we examine the meter's readings," stated Egon.
They all gathered around the small black instrument as Ray retrieved the data.
"As you can see, the readings are almost negative," stated Ray, pointing at the small screen. "According to the meter, they oughta' be rocks for as low an ectopresence as they emit. But the meter also indicated an outlined presence of nearly infinite strength."
"Like they're there and they're not at the same time?" inquired Louis.
"Or maybe they just summon their power when they really need it," remarked Peter.
"That's what I was thinking," said Ray. "Any thoughts, Spengs?"
"Only a question. Where is this puzzle box now?"
"Still back at the apartment," answered Louis. "I was too busy trying to avoid those freaky creatures to worry about it. Chances are they're still after me."
"And they found you before at my bookshop despite its being over two miles away. So they could probably locate you here," connected Ray.
"That would be extraordinarily bad," stated Egon flatly.
They were too busy analyzing and brooding over the meter's odd output to hear someone enter through the firehouse doors. "Guys, I'm back. What's up?" chirped Winston Zeddemore, their fellow Ghostbuster.
"Yaaaah! Don't scare us like that!" shouted all in unison.
"Now I know something's up," said Winston.
"Well, Janine's been kidnapped by ugly demons from another dimension, Ray's bookshop is in total ruin, the meter's collected the strangest readings we've ever encountered, and those beasts are probably on the way here for Louis. Aside from that, things are hunky-dory," deadpanned Peter.
"I'm going to go check in Spates Catalog and Tobin's Spirit Guide," said Egon.
"Good idea," joined Ray. "Then we can go back to my ruined bookshop and see what we can dig up there. Pete, you and Winston suit up, take Ecto over to Janine's apartment and see if you can find that box."
"And I thought we were going to stay here and play Beefeater for Louis," smarted Peter.
"Take him with you," called Ray from the stairs.
"Beefeater?" asked Winston.
"Nickname for English tower guards during the Renaissance Period," shouted Ray. Just then the telephone rang and was picked up by the computerized answering service and put on speakerphone.
"Help us, Ghostbusters!! We're over here at The World entertainment complex and there are these weird...OH MY GOD!! They just tore out his brain!! Get over here NOW!! The address is 12534...Oh shit; they're coming this way...uh, Restaurant Row, building number--"
The call went dead and was replaced by dial tone. The office computer printed out as much information as it had gathered. Shortly thereafter the fire bell rang.
"Looks like playing detective will have to wait," remarked Peter to Winston as Ray and Egon slid down the fire pole.
Thousands of miles away, in Pomona, California, John Merchant snapped awake from a restless afternoon nap. "I've got to get to New York right away," thought John.
At Vineland Home for Girls in New Jersey, as the girls were sitting down to dinner, Kirsty Cotton suddenly started screaming.
Ecto-1 peeled out of the firehouse on the way to The World, sirens blaring.