Chapter Nine

That was when Winston and Ray pulled up in Ecto 1. A crowd had begun to form around us. Ray made his way over, Winston close behind.

"What happened?" Ray asked.

"Storage facility blew." Egon motioned to Peck. "He shut off the protection grid."

"Oh, great." Ray sighed quietly.

"That's bad, isn't it?" Winston asked.

"Yeah."

Peter looked around. "Where's the Keymaster?"

Egon's eyes widened and he looked around in alarm, like a child who forgot their homework on the day it was due. "Shit!"

"Who's the Keymaster?" Ray looked confused.

"Oh, come on." Egon grabbed his arm.

"I'll explain it to you two later." I told them. Both Ray and Winston nodded. We started to leave, but Peck stopped us.

"Hold it! I want this man arrested!" he pointed at my brother. "Captain, these people are in criminal violation of the Environmental Protection Act. And this explosion is a direct result of it!"

"Oh, bullshit!" I yelled.

"Your mother!" Egon yelled and lunged at him, but was held back by cops. All of us got into a fight right then.

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As a result of the fight, we were brought to jail. We were locked in the cell and I paced for a few minutes.

"Hey, guard!" Winston said. "Look, I want to make a phone call. I just work with these guys, man, I wasn't even there!" he shook his head and made his way back over to us. Peter looked at me.

"Please, stop pacing." he said.

"When I'm nervous, I pace." I said. Egon walked over to me and he held me still.

"Nancy, look at me." He said quietly. I looked up at him. "Everything's going to be fine. We'll get this straightened out. I promise." His words, I knew, were sincere. But he looked nervous as hell. I didn't know if it was this whole ordeal or if it was because he was near me. But I knew for a fact that I was damn near lightheaded, trying not to be an idiot just because he held me still. So, to steer clear of any foolishness, I only nodded. "Okay." Egon seemed a little satisfied with that. "Come back over here." We walked back over to a table. "The structure of this roof cap is exactly like the kind of telemetry tracker that NASA uses to identify dead pulsars in deep space." He was looking over some layouts. Ray opened a blueprint and placed it on the table.

"Cold-riveted girders with cores of pure selenium." He said. Peter looked around.

"Everybody getting this so far?" he asked. We all looked around. Everyone else that was in the cell with us was crowded around us. "So what? I guess they just don't make them like they used to."

Ray smacked him upside the head. "No! Nobody ever made them like this! I mean, the architect was either a certified genius or an authentic wacko."

"Ray...for a moment...pretend I don't know anything about metallurgy, engineering, or physics...and just tell me what the hell is going on."

Ray shook his head. "You never studied." We all looked at the blueprints again. "The whole building is a huge superconductive antenna that was designed and built expressly for the purpose of pulling in and concentrating spiritual turbulence. Your girlfriend lives in the corner penthouse of Spook Central."

"She's not my girlfriend. I find her interesting because she's a client and she sleeps above her covers. Four feet above her covers." He held his hand up to indicate how high. "She barks, she drools, she claws..."

"It's not the girl, Peter, it's the building." Egon explained. "Something terrible is about to enter our world and this building is obviously the door. The architect's name was Ivo Shandor. I found it in Tobin's Spirit Guide. He was also a doctor. Performed a lot of unnecessary surgery. And then, in 1920, he started a secret society."

"Let me guess." Peter held his head high. "Gozer worshipers."

"Right."

"No studying." He held his head up proudly as Ray rolled his eyes. Egon continued.

"After World War 1, Shandor decided that society was too sick to survive." He looked around as more people crowded in to hear the story. "And he wasn't alone. He had close to a thousand followers when he died. They conducted rituals up on the roof...bizarre rituals intended to bring about the end of the world," Egon stood slowly. "And now it looks like it may actually happen."

Peter broke into song, making me jump. Ray shook his head.

"We have to get out of here and we've got to find a judge or something."

"Hey, wait a minute. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Hold it." Winston said. Everyone got quiet. "Now are we actually going to go before a federal judge and say that some moldy Babylonian god is gonna drop in on Central Park West and start tearing up the city?"

"Sumerian, not Babylonian." Egon corrected.

"Yeah, big difference." Peter nodded. Winston shook his head.

"No offense...but I gotta get my own lawyer."

"No offense taken." I held up my hand.

"You don't know that." Peter cocked an eyebrow at me. I shrugged.

"Okay, Ghostbusters." We heard the guard say. "The mayor wants to see you guys. The whole island's going crazy. Let's go."

"Awesome, awesome." I smiled. Peter clapped his hands once.

"I gotta split. The mayor wants to rap with me about some things." He said. Egon began to fold the blueprints.

"Need help?" I asked.

"I got it. Thanks." Egon and I locked eyes for half a second and I about died. The nervousness came back and then he had to go past me to get out. I followed soon after. Egon wasn't very hard to read. I knew exactly what he does whenever he likes someone.

That was exactly it.