The Damocles Solution 20
Janine saw Egon stir back to consciousness, and kissed him lightly on the forehead, saying a silent prayer. "Egon? Egon!" she said, with growing desperation as she stroked his hair. "Egon, answer me! Are you still there?"
He cracked open his exhausted, red-rimmed eyes, and nodded his head slightly. The fire was now in full control. "How…long…was I…?" he asked, somewhat disoriented.
"I don't know, I don't have a watch. I know it was quite a while…" Relieved to see a sliver of his now strangely dull-greenish eyes, she ran her hands over his face, tearing up. "Egon…you're getting worse by the second-"
"—back…there," he whispered, deflecting her, and closed his eyes while he gestured with his head. "Back by the wall."
"W—what?" His tone was rather repelling. She looked confused for a moment, then turned toward the back wall. "The communicator? Oh…:"
She left his side for a moment, and looked on the floor. There were small rocks all over the back area of the prison that she all but threw out of the way. Eventually, she came upon a small black plastic square. She picked it up, and gasped in horror when a chunk of the casing fell into her hand. She went over to him again.
His mouth was now slighly opened, perspiration trailing down his brow. In between labored breaths he managed to say, "Doesn't…work."
She switched the communicator on, and, sure enough, the light remained off. She wiped a tear away with her robe, and started shaking the communicator, turning it off and on and off again with growing frustration.
"I'd need…both hands to fix it…"
Janine glared at the device. "Well, I have two hands to fix it!" She turned the power on, and when she saw it was not active, she gave an exasperated, grunted cry, and started banging the communicator on a large rock in frustration.
He turned his head over to her, and managed to raise an eyebrow as he watched her hit the communicator over and over, tearing up and cursing. God, did she remind him of a female incarnation of Peter, sometimes.
She continued to hammer away with the device.
"Janine…that won't…"
Were he able to say his next thought fast enough, he would have had to eat his words. He managed to widen his eyes when the device beeped, and the green light appeared, and static could be heard.
His lips came together, and pressed for a moment. How could he not have thought of something so…simple?
"Oh, thank God!" She hugged the communicator to herself like it was a child's comforting blanket. Hearing a deep, rattling groan behind her, she scurried back over to him, calling his name.
He looked vacant and dazed for a moment, his eyelids struggling to stay open. "I…keep losing focus", he whispered, tipping his head way back and snarling. "So…warm in here…green…so…" He shook his head gently, fighting the poison anew. "In the case…I cannot regain consciousness, here is…what to tell them," he began. In between loud, labored breaths, he started with telling her which PKE frequency to isolate so the men can quickly find and destroy the powerful Jormungar braziers he had observed in Aracelli's household.
Dr. Venkman thought he heard a familiar beep. He screwed his mouth up…naaaah. In his half-sleep, he musta heard somethin' out in the street.
He stumbled to the kitchen, and popped open the fridge, eager for a midnight-ish snack.
A strange, eerie feeling crept up on him, like the feeling when a fall chill blows through the air to herald the coldness of winter. He went pale, and his eyes shifted to their corners.
He spun around, his eyes flashing as they faced opposite the fridge now.
"A-HA!"
And…nothing happened.
He frowned. Maybe if I tried it again.
"A…HA!"
There was another pause, leaving him pointing like a hunting dog, at thin air. And, infurated at the nothingness that occurred, balled a fist and shook it into the air. "Slimer! At least you can have the decency to splat into me…when I'm ready for you!" he hissed.
In fact, it had been a nerve-racking experience for the intrepid psychologist to live with such a changed Slimer. Every time he went in the door, he gasped in anticipation of what always happened, but didn't. He never got a face full of congealed, sticky PKE, he was never knocked to the floor, and he certainly didn't have to take a shower to get green goop off him in way too many hours now.
It was driving him batty. He was just waiting. Waiting and watching, now solely for the green ghost to turn his bizarre adjusted personality back to normal, and…just…hit 'im in the face with it.
About to go upstairs after a drink of water, he stopped short. He heard the sound again by the uniform closets.
Making his way over, he figured out that indeed, a communicator was, in fact, ringing.
He reached in the closet and flicked it on, puzzled. "Who the hell wants my business at this time of night?"
"Dr. Venkman—" began Janine.
"Janiiiiiiiine! What are you calling me this late for? And on this thing to boot? You wanna give me the play-by-play with Spengs or something? That's pretty disgusting, in my op-"
"—Doctor Venkman…please stop….he's dying…!"
Peter's entire body went cold. "…Janine?"
"Dr. Venkman! P-Peter! Help us! He's dying! He's going to die if you and the guys don't do something!" Sobbing could be heard throught he heavy static. "He's going to die!"
Not good at all. She called him by his first name. And said "please". He knew when to cut the crap, and the time was now. He raked his free hand through his hair, and then placed it on his hip. "It'll be alright. Talk to me. Where are you?" he said, pacing back and forth.
"Held underground…he's dying…ya gotta get here!"
His brow snapped down, and he hurried over to Janine's desk and threw himself in her chair. He grabbed a pen. "How closely are you being watched or guarded?" he asked.
"I dunno! There's no one in the room, but there's lots of really strong demonic entities in this house…Dolores Aracelli's house!"
"Ok. Tell me everything you know."
She told him everything…Egon's horrible condition, Aracelli's plan, the secret of the braziers in the house, a quick layout of the house, and anything else she could think of that might help the guys find them quickly.
"Please hurry! She's going to kill him!" she said to him in terror as she ran out of things to say.
"Alright, Janine. It'll be OK. We're not all that far away. Have this thing on whenever you can. We'll be right there."
He slammed his fist on the alarm, and it blared loudly throughout the firehouse.
Winston appeared first, ready to rock. "What's goin' on?" Ray was close on his heels.
Peter spoke quickly as he ran toward E-1. "Spengs is way down for the count, he's gonna get counted out of the championship soon if we don't get to 'im. Janine is there with him, and they're stuck underground by a crazy damned old hag and her zoo crew."
"Oh no," Ray gasped, deeply troubled.
Winston started back, appalled. Egon, and especially Janine, were in trouble. And he was the original catalyst of her being there.
Seconds later, Ray, Winston, who was now angered and silenced by guilt, and Peter were ready to dive in the Ecto-1.
Ray, finished suiting up, too, knitted his ruddy brows resolutely. "I'm gonna grab Slimer, then take a PKE meter along in Ecto-2 to help track down the correct house more quickly by air."
Peter nodded and spun around to the shotgun position . "Sounds good, Ray. Let's roll out there. Kick ass, gentlemen, and take no prisoners!"
Ray, high above the other two guys and Slimer in Ecto-2, clicked on the communicator as he hovered, PKE meter pointing at the huge mansion in the distance. "Hey, guys, got strong readings here…at least one class VII with numerous and layered echoes to boot! I got the target place in sight!" He clicked the PKE meter, adjusting it again to isolate the signals from the Jormungar braziers in the house. "We've got signals from exactly four braziers inside."
Peter was heard on the communicator. "Where we headin' next, Tex?"
He looked over the side of the little craft, down at the ground. "Take the next exit and follow the stretch of empty highway to a large brick-and-white house surrounded by a large garden."
Peter clicked his own device, knowing soon they'd be there due to Winston nailing the gas pedal the whole time. He had to make sure he was talking above the siren, as it blared loudly in the background. "Roger that. Remember we're not even stoppin' to take names here, just blasting and trapping our way to Egon and Janine!" Slimer, floating eagerly between the back seat and the front, was clutching the back of Peter's seat, and watching, looking wide-eyed and intensely worried, where Winston was driving.
"Peter! We do have two important names on our 'hit' list already!—this 'Morgan', and Aracelli. And I think it'd be a good idea to shut off the siren as soon as you get to the highway, guys," suggested Ray. "We wanna do this as carefully as we can so as not to give 'em any motivation to hurt Janine," he had to grit his teeth at the next thought, but had to say it, "or do anything else they haven't done to Egon already!"
Winston leaned over, and signaled to Peter that he wanted to talk. "Right, man, the plan is to clear the house of those statue-things first, then go for the ol' lady and her lackey when they're weakened enough!"
"That also means as soon as we see 'em, we gotta trap 'em, and we can't let 'em run away," added Peter. "We don't need any informants going to the Big Boss to squeal on us crashing their little party."
"Right!" acknowledged Ray.
"Let's go on a good-ol' fashioned snake hunt, guys, just like they do in Texas. Maybe we'll each come back with a nice pair of boots!"