Chapter 37:
The portal opened the the trio dropped out of the portal and landed on the ground. They stood up and brushed themselves off.
"Well, I must say that sliding at night is pretty spooky. I mean, we never know where we are when it's light out." Sam said.
"Agreed." Rebecca said.
"Where should we go?" Michael asked. "See if the hotel will give us a room?"
"Maybe we should go by Cal-U." Sam replied.
"Too late for that." Rebecca said.
"Well, there is a light over at the Frankenstein place." Michael said, pointing toward The Mallory House.
"Maybe we can check in the morning. I second the idea about the hotel." Rebecca said. "Don't know who lives there on this world and all."
"Right. We'll come back tomorrow and investigate. See if we can't find some stuff to keep the timer in tip top condition." Michael said.
The next day, they walked up to The Mallory House and Michael knocked on the door. The door opened and an old woman opened the door.
"Oh! You came so quickly! I haven't even called yet!" she said. "Come in, come in."
The trio walked into the house and closed the door behind them. The woman stood in front of the door to the basement.
"So, uh, what seems to be the problem?" Michael asked.
"Well, you should know, being paranormal investigators and all." she said.
"Right..." Michael said. "Ghosts?"
"We're the Ghostbusters on this world!" Sam whispered to Rebecca.
"Ghosts, yes." she said. "Oh, how silly of me, I haven't even told you my name! I'm Mrs. Mallory."
"Well then, Mrs. Mallory, when did you start to notice the ghosts?" Michael asked.
"Well, I've always felt there was someone else here, but I had assumed it was just me feeling my husband or son." Mrs. Mallory said. "But I started to notice things moving and hearing voices last night, around nine or ten o'clock."
"That's when we slid in." Rebecca whispered to Sam.
"Your son?" Michael asked.
"He... disappeared several years ago. I haven't seen him since. They never found his body or anything." Mrs. Mallory said.
"Well, we'll do our best to detect if there are really ghosts here." Michael said, taking out the timer and holding it up.
"You'll want to check the basement, that's where Quinn was last seen."
"We'll do a check and see what we can do." Rebecca said, as the trio descended down the stairs.
Michael held the timer out and started to press buttons and waved it around. He looked at the screen.
"So, what are we doing?" Sam asked.
"This is going to shock you, but I'm getting a reading." Michael replied.
"Of ghosts?" Rebecca asked.
"No, it's some sort of wormhole. I remember Quinn telling me something like this. Their timer malfunctioned and Quinn was sent out of phase. He said that this girl they met thought she saw ghosts, but they figured it was out of phase sliders." Michael replied. "So I set the timer to track slight inter-dimensional readings, as opposed to the bigger wormholes that it usually does."
"So that we can find the ghosts?" Sam asked.
"Ghosts, no. More like out of phase sliders. My guess is that we'll find Quinn, Wade and Professor Arturo somewhere in here. Rembrandt was probably spared the experience in this reality, since it seems like whatever caused this was centered squarely within this room." Michael said. "But we're going to need more equipment, and I think whatever this Quinn left behind might work."
"Everything okay down there?" Mrs. Mallory asked.
"Uh, yeah. But we need to ask your permission for something." Rebecca said.
"What is it?" she asked.
"You see, we've never really experienced readings like the ones we've found here before. We've theorized it, but we don't have the proper equipment to deal with it. However, whatever your son was working on before he disappeared might help us upgrade our current equipment." Michael said. "May we use it?"
"Well, I guess so. It's probably outdated though." Mrs. Mallory said.
"We can make do. We'd have to go back to our HQ and if we do that we might lose the ghosts." Sam said.
"Okay then. Call me if you want to know anything." Mrs. Mallory said.
Michael sat at Quinn's workstation and started to pull apart a large gray plastic brick.
"What's that?" Sam asked.
"It seems to be the original device that Quinn used to open the portal. Before he perfected the timer." Michael replied. "The problem, is that it's connected to a power source that's been shut off for almost two decades."
"So, what do we use to power it?" Sam asked.
"Well, I'm taking it apart to make it smaller. Find me some sort of battery." Michael said.
"Like this?" Rebecca asked, picking up a large battery.
"Yeah, can you find something that we can put it in so I could move freely with it?" Michael asked.
"Like that floating backpack?" Sam asked.
"Floating backpack?" Michael asked, looking in front of him. "Floating backpack works."
"Is that?" Rebecca asked.
"Probably." Michael replied. "Thanks Quinn."
"But if they're out of phase, how can they touch stuff?" Rebecca asked.
"Our sliding in might have brought them slightly back into phase." Michael replied.
"Okay, got the battery hooked up to a wire." Sam said.
"Attach it to this." Michael said, holding the stripped down version of the original portal opener.
"Done." Sam said.
"Strap it on." Michael said, picking the battery pack up and putting the backpack on.
"That looks a lot like a proton pack from Ghostbusters." Sam said.
"You bet your ass it does." Michael said, smiling.
"You nerd." Rebecca said.
"Who you gonna call?" Michael asked, holding the portal opener up.
"You giant nerd." Rebecca said.
Michael stood with the proton pack aimed at the center of the room. Sam and Rebecca stood behind him.
"You ready?" Michael asked.
"Let's do this." Sam said.
"Now!" Michael said, and activated the device. A portal opened up in the middle of the room.
A figure appeared in the portal, and walked into the center, revealing himself to be Quinn Mallory, looking around the age he was when he discovered sliding.
"Quinn?" Michael asked.
"Yeah?" Quinn responded. "You can see me?"
"We've made a gateway to see into where you phased into." Michael said. "We're sliders, like you, and we think our sliding in brought you closer to being in phase."
"That would make sense." Quinn said. "Do you have any idea on getting us back into phase?"
"I don't." Michael said. "I'm not that experienced with any of your technology, just enough to create this."
"Mr. Mallory!" a voice shouted. "Allow me to speak.
"That's Professor Arturo. It's been tough being out of phase for this long." Quinn said as Arturo pushed him out of the way.
"Young man, I have theorized that it may be possible to open up another portal that will return us to the proper plane, but the issue is that it requires a large burst of power." Arturo said. "And we can't touch anything, stupid alternate plane..."
"We can try, but... No promises." Michael said.
Michael stood in front of the stairs and aimed the proton pack. He pressed a few buttons as the proton pack hummed, getting louder.
"Now!" Sam shouted, as he pulled the switch on Quinn's generator.
The portal opened and the older sliders fell out of it. They stood up, and looked at the three "paranormal investigators".
"Thank you three." Arturo said. Michael noted that the sliders now appeared to be older, closer to their actual age. "It would appear that the trip through brought our outer appearance in sync with our inner appearance."
"Thanks you guys." Quinn said.
"What's going on down there?" Mrs. Mallory asked, walking down the stairs. She stopped when she got to the bottom. "Quinn?"
"Mom!" Quinn shouted.
"Well, Mr. Mallory, I am glad to be home." Arturo said.
"Anyway, we have to get out of here." Michael said.
"Thank you three. Thank you so much!" Mrs. Mallory said, through tears.
"Don't mention it." Michael said, smiling as he, Sam and Rebecca left the basement.
To Be Continued...