The garage door of the firehouse opened wide as Ecto-1, with its lights and siren blaring, backed into the building parked in the center of the garage quickly. Through the opened door of the garage Janine could see Ecto-2 drive by to pull into the parking space set up for it behind the firehouse itself. As the lights and siren turned off she rose from her desk and walked over to the rear of the parked hearse as Winston opened the driver's side door.

"Winston? What's going on? What's with all the commotion?"

"It's a little complicated." Winston stated as he pulled open the rear passenger door of the hearse and leaned inside to put his hands under Egon's shoulders.

"Egon! What happened?!" Janine covered her mouth with her hands as the shock of seeing her dear friend in such a horrid state caught her off guard. "Is he going to be alright?"

"We think so." Winston confirmed as Ray raced through the backdoor of the firehouse and joined him at the hearse. "He's unconscious but he's stable."

"Did he wake up at all during the drive?" Ray asked as he bent down to scoop up Egon's legs and help carry him out of the vehicle.

"No, he was out the whole time." Winston confirmed as he lifted Egon up from the seat and supported the weight of his limp upper body in his hands.

Ray let out a weary sigh as he and Winston worked together to lift Egon up and out of the back of the hearse. "Well, let's hope he comes around soon. We still have so many questions that need answers and he's the only one who has them!"

Janine followed quietly as Ray and Winston carried Egon up the stairs to the second floor of the firehouse and into the sanctuary of the bunk room so he could recover in peace.

Unable to withstand the horrendous pain in his head any longer Peter resided to curling up on his side on the stone bench in a desperate bid to sleep and escape the perpetual ache that gnawed at his every nerve.

"She'll kill you, you know?" A mysterious disembodied voice of a young female spoke to Peter from an unseen location.

"Pardon?" Peter's eyes popped open as he looked around his cell confusedly. "Who's speaking, please?"

"It's just me." The voice replied playfully. "Your new neighbor."

"Neighbor, huh? How long have you been here?"

"Long enough." She answered casually. "In time she'll grow tired of you and kill you. Then the cycle begins anew."

"Cycle?" Peter didn't understand what she was talking about. "What cycle?"

"You'll find out soon enough." The voice giggled in a somewhat playful manner as she provided her cryptic answer. "Stay quiet for now, or else her minions will tell her about our conversation."

"What minions?"

The voice didn't respond, she fell as silent as she had been when Peter first arrived.

"Hello? Miss?"

Nothing.

"...Fine." Peter closed his eyes and tried to sleep through the pounding headache that throbbed in his skull mercilessly. "I didn't want to know anyway..."

Janine was sitting on the edge of Egon's bed with a cold, damp washcloth in her hand and a first aid kit sitting on the nightstand beside it. His broken glasses were folded neatly beside the kit, despite being rendered useless from damage. She gently cleaned the various cuts and scraped along Egon's forehead and under his swollen eye. As she delicately pressed the cold compress against the tender injuries Egon began to loll his head back and forth slowly against his pillow.

"Shh..." Janine soothed calmly and quietly as she pressed the cold washcloth against Egon's swollen black eye with a light pressure. "You're safe now."

Moving as carefully as possible Janine unzipped the jumpsuit down from Egon's chest to where the fabric of the suit had been torn apart by Moirai's attac with the sharpened rocks. The zipper itself has been destroyed which left Janine with no choice but to pull the connected teeth apart with her hands until the entirety of the jumpsuit had been open. The black fabric of his t-shirt was also shredded and saturated with dried blood that stuck the fabric to Egon's skin like glue. Through the holes in the t-shirt the bloodied cuts and dark bruises were visible against his naturally pale complexion.

"These cuts are going to get infected." Janine whispered as she set about cleaning the long laceration across his chest. As the cold washcloth made contact with Egon's tender skin his entire body tensed in response to the chilly touch, causing the laceration to begin bleeding again. "It'll be okay Egon," Janine reassured her injured friend. "just be patient and give yourself a chance to heal."

Taking in a sharp deep breath Egon, sweating, suddenly bolted upright on his bed with abject fear in his eyes. As he sat up Janine leaned back but put her hands up and pressed them lightly against Egon's chest.

"Easy! You're safe!"

"Peter?" Egon asked panting as he awoke from his nightmare. "Where's Peter?"

Janine shook her head solemnly. "We don't know. Not yet."

Egon's eyes shut and he bowed his head sadly. "It's my fault. I should've been able to protect him."

"No," Janine refuted as she moved one hand to the side of Egon's face and gently caressed his cheek. "what happened out there wasn't your fault. We all know you'd never leave anyone behind or give up on a friend."

Unable to fend off the guilt Egon continued to blame himself. "Peter wasn't feeling well. I never should've asked him to go with me. And I should've looked into the call, should've confirmed the legitimacy of the case before even leaving..."

"Egon," Janine refused to let him blame himself any further. "it's NOT your fault."

Too tired, too weak and feeling too defeated to keep his emotional resolve he leaned forward toward Janine desperately needing to feel safe amongst friends. "I'm so sorry Janine... Peter's gone and I couldn't do anything to stop it."

Janine wrapped her arms around Egon's shoulder and ran her hand through his hair as she embraced him in a warm hug. "At least you're safe..."

Rather than giving Egon a sense of comfort Janine's words filled him with guilt. He had survived the attack and avoided being abducted by Moirai while Peter hadn't been so fortunate.

Slowly Janine loosened her hug around Egon and returned her hand to the side of his face to retain the sense of much needed comfort. "Now, please, let me help you. Try to get some rest and let me take care of you. I mean!" Janine blushed a little. "I mean your injuries! Let me help you get cleaned up..."

Egon didn't even notice the comment or react to Janine's brief embarrassment. Moving his hand slowly up to the collar of his torn t-shirt he tried to lift the fabric up and over is head but he didn't have the strength.

"Here." Janine gently took hold of the shirt by the collar and around the shoulders to pull the damaged garment from Egon's body to completely expose the wounds beneath. But the sight of the cuts, bruises and dried blood was a little too extreme for her to bear. Keeping her cool Janine focused on cleaning up the injuries without showing her discomfort to her suffering friend. "Now, let me go find the first aid kit. We're going to need more than just a few bandages for this."

Egon watched as Janine calmly exited the bunk room for the adjoined bathroom to retrieve the large first aid kit stored inside the room. Looking down at his arms and chest Egon lifted a hand and watched it tremble from physical weakness before clenching it into a tight fist of frustration.

"I'm sorry Peter. I'll find a way to save you."

Downstairs in the private lab Ray had begun researching the name Moirai through Tobin's Spirit Guide, but found no leads. The other volumes of paranormal entities and locales provided just as little information about the mysterious deity leading only to a dead end. Despite the extensive collection of impressively detailed reports of any and all paranormal entities, deities, gods, demons and other super natural beings Ray was unable to locate the name Moirai and quickly grew frustrated with the lack of definitive answers.

Massive stacks of hastily read books lined the desk and were piling up on the floor beside Ray's chair where he sat. Manila folders that contained sightings, photographs and other pieces of paranormal evidence had also proven useless during this particular search for answers, and were strewn about with uncharacteristic indifference by the engineer.

"I've been looking for hours and found nothing!" Ray slammed the book down on the desk and pressed the palms of his hands against his eyes. "But I KNOW I've heard that name before! But where?"

"Moirai?" Winston wrote the name out on a notepad and stared at it as if the answer would materialize before his eyes. "Sounds like a character in a sci-fi novel."

Sighing Ray leaned forward and tried to clear the frustration from his thoughts.

"Maybe you should take a break? You haven't eaten anything all day and the last thing we need is another Ghostbuster to end up bedridden."

"Yeah, yeah. I know."

"Go drink some coffee and find something to eat. I'll keep looking through the books for you."

"No, no..." Ray stubbornly refused to budge from his seat. "I can do this, I just need a little more time."

"Remember what I said about stubborn scientists?" Winston joked a little to try and lighten the mood.

"Not stubborn." Ray denied. "Just focused."

"And tired. Go take a break."

"No, I'm fine! Really!"

"Okay Ray, if you say so." Winston didn't believe his friend's claims to be alright, but he also didn't want to push his stress limits to a breaking point. "Well, what can I do to help?"

"Uh, I don't know. Maybe go see how Egon is doing. I'm going to go back through these books, I must've missed something. Maybe her name has a different spelling than what we're assuming or she's a lesser being with a small section in the book."

"But if this name isn't in your usual array of paranormal documents," Winston had a new thought. He pointed a finger as he processed his idea and addressed Ray confidently. "then maybe she's a being that comes myths or legends."

"Myths?" Ray dropped his hands from his eyes as eureka flashed through his mind. "Wait a minute! That's it!" He turned and pointed to a large leather bound tome on the shelf of the far wall. "Greek Mythology! That's where I know the name!"

Winston grabbed the book and handed it to Ray who threw open the cover and began sifting quickly through the pages. Like a man on a mission Ray scanned through each page until he found the name he had been so impatiently looking for.

"There! Moirai!" Ray put his finger down on the printed name and pointed for Winston to see. "Moirai is the personification of fate itself!"

"Fate? What does fate want with Peter?"

"I... That I don't know." Ray admitted with a slight hesitation.

"Great." Winston sat down on the desk next to the book and stared blankly at the floor, lost in deep thought. "We answer one question only to have another pop up."

"Well, at least we made some progress." Ray tried to remain optimistic but the doubt in his mind was evident as he spoke. "And now that we've identified the 'who' we can now identify the 'why' and uncover her reason for attacking Egon and taking Peter as her prisoner."

"I hope so." Winston looked down at his watch and noted the time. "It's been almost nine hours since they were attacked. Who knows what shape Peter is in?"

"If Egon is anything to go by then we can assume it won't be good..."

...to be continued...