Chapter 10: Imperfect Image

Ghostbusters HQ

4:05 AM

Dan walked to his older-looking self and got a good look. He was heavier with a bushier beard that looks to have been untrimmed, gray hairs beginning to stick out from place to place. His uniform looked slightly different than the standard fair. He looked at the no-ghost logo on his arm and saw it was not red inside the circle-slash, but instead had two light blue stripes running parallel to the slash on a white background with 4 red six-pointed stars through the slash. It resembled the Chicago municipal flag, "Okay, what fresh hell did I just wake up to?"

"Man," Eduardo said confused, "why are there two of Dans?"

"You're asking me like I have a clue?" Old Man Dan responded, "All I know is that I can't raise 5 different teams of Ghostbusters after a ball of light jumps at me from nowhere!" He turned and motioned to Janine, "Next thing I know, the director of Customer Service Operations is sitting at Dr. Venkman's old desk, like she's still the secretary, and I'm looking at a bunch of people I've never seen before in this building! Well," he motioned back at his younger self, "with the exception of you, anyway!"

"What's going on down here?" Old Man Dan looked to the voice and saw something that shook his foundations; he saw Dr. Egon Spengler walking down the stairs. He rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn't just his over-tired eyes playing tricks on him, "No fucking way."

Egon reached the bottom of the stairs and took notice of what was happening before him. He looked back and forth between the two Dans, putting his hand to his chin, "Fascinating. I was picking up a pan-dimensional variation when the Second Stanza was played. I would have to assume…"

"Dr. Spengler?" Old Man Dan said in shock, "No, it can't be! You're… You… died in 2014!"

Dan turned to Egon, "Egon, is he real? He's not some kind of…"

Roland had already taken his meter and performed a scan, "No, he's a human, and he's alive. Look at this," he handed the meter to him and pointed out the graph, "He is you." Looking at the meter, Dan saw for himself the energy pattern almost matched. Roland explained, "Right after Egon told us about your… other thing, I removed the hard-programmed exclusions." Egon took the meter from Dan, "Hmmm. According to this, your energy is only slightly different due to metabolic slowdown which denotes he's older than you by 10 years."

Old Man Dan lost his temper and slapped the meter from Egon's hands, screaming loud as he about lost his mind, "Will you stop treating me like a fucking puzzel and tell me what the fuck's going on?!" Everyone jumped back from that. Egon immediately and calmly cleared his throat, "Uh, right. Yes. Perhaps we should step into my lab upstairs…"

"Egon, I hate to do this, but," Kylie interrupted him, "we have a lot to report first including the cult that abducted Lita," that was when she realized Dan was back at the firehouse. She turned to him, "Lita?" "She's okay. She's upstairs recovering. You missed a lot." She looked intently at his face, noticing all the cuts and swelling was gone, "That light we saw?"

"She healed me."

"Look," Old Man Dan was losing his patience again, "I'll take everyone else's briefings so long as someone explains something to me here! I'm clearly not where I belong here!"

"Jesus," Dan commented, "I never realized I was this high-strung."

"Hey, asshole," the older man growled, "You run a Ghostbusters operation for 20 years, be attacked relentlessly by flying jagoffs for 3 goddamned months in the middle of a pandemic, get 2 hours a sleep a night, and not be high-strung!"

"We clearly have a lot of information to sort through," Egon stated, picking up the meter that was knocked from his grip, "We better get upstairs."

4:45 AM

After explaining the mutation of Issac Hacker to those present in Egon's Lab, Amy handed her computer to Egon and played back the readings and breakdown of the cement elevator scaffold and the control box, "See here. I scanned this control system that was attached to the structure and Roland mentioned the emitters are the same as in your traps." Egon took the small device as he adjusted his glasses as he looked at the breakdown.

At first, Egon looked at the computer screen with curiosity, but after a moment or two, the look of alarm crept onto his face, "Oh, no. Oh, no! Eiffel's Ecto-Controller!"

Dan saw the look on his face and heard the words from his mouth, putting his coffee down, "Uh oh. Egon's worried!"

"Eiffel's controller?" Kylie parroted, "How did they replicate that?"

Eduardo raised an eyebrow, "Uh, no entiendo?"

Kylie walked to him and grabbed him by his goatee angrily, him yelping in pain from her pulling on it, "Eiffel's control box! You really need to read the caselogs, Eduardo! Or does the concept of reading stop at preteen novels and Marmaduke comics?"

Old Man Dan had been watching the team interaction for some time, growing rather disgusted with what was happening before him. He looked to Egon, "What the hell's with Lydia Deetz over here? She's been copping an attitude with Cheech Marin for some time now."

She let go of Eduardo's beard, raised her own eyebrow, and growled out, "'Lydia Deetz'? I am not a Tim Burton character!"

"Got quite the cast of characters here, Spengler. You got Lucy and Desi over here," after pointing at Kylie and Eduardo, Old Man Dan used his thumb to point behind him at Roland who was at his bench, "You got Carlton Banks back over here."

Roland saw and heard that and immediately became indignant, "Hey!"

The old extra-dimensional Ghostbuster continued by pointing at Serena, Mina, Amy, and Darien, "And over here you got somewhere between Team Rocket and the cast of Speed Racer. Not to mention, my counterpart being built like my High School Vi-Ed teacher, and you sporting the mother of all bleach jobs." Egon's eyes widened in surprise at the rapid-fire insults pouring from the man's mouth. He was floored.

Mina's mouth was open in surprise. She couldn't believe it, "Geez, I never thought Dan could be such a jerk!"

"I'm not a jerk, sweetheart," the man responded, "I'm a dick. My ability to give a fuck died years ago."

Egon knew the other Dan in the room was just gonna continue being what he was if he didn't stop him. The best thing to do was to fill everyone in on the history of the control box, "In 1987, myself and the others were called to Paris because there was a sudden uptick in paranormal activity. We found when we got there that Gustave Eiffel was a fellow paranormal scientist and secretly used his tower as a rudimentary containment structure. Workers repairing and upgrading the tower's equipment went into Eiffel's pavilion and found the control box that made the structure psionically porous, breaking it in the process.

"We had to find Eiffle's notes because the most powerful of the ghosts were escaping and build a new control unit. Myself with the help of the French government built a new unit, but we were unable to power it on in time before it was destroyed by the ghosts that did escape," he lifted Amy's minicomputer and showed the breakdown, "According to Amy's scans, there is a control system on the side of the cement structure that looks like the replacement system I built, but with even more modern parts. There is one thing that still vexes me. A structure that small shouldn't be able to absorb that much power; the surface area is too small for even steel tubing to absorb that much psychokinetic energy."

Amy walked back up and took the computer back from him, and after a moment of typing on it handed it back, "It's not steel tubing. It's an alloy of magnesium and tungsten…" "Filled with selenium?" Everyone turned back to Old Man Dan to see his eyes open wide, "Please, don't tell me…"

Egon was also surprised when he read the readout, "Yes. Ivo Shandor's conductive composite. This is not good. Not only do our enemies have access to the recorder, they have access to Eiffel's and Shandor's materials, and have the resources to build such expensive structures," he handed the computer back to Amy, "This is going to be more of a problem than we originally thought."

"I don't understand," Kylie walked to Amy to look at the computer herself, "exactly how do these materials work like that?"

"Think of it like an otherworldly set of control rods," Old Man Dan stated aloud, "In a nuclear reactor, they use boron to absorb neutrons and poison the fission in the reactor. The magnesium in the alloy allows the PKE to get in, but the tungsten reflects it back onto itself, keeping it from escaping, like a mirror. They use tungsten as a neutron reflector in accelerators and in some reactor designs to increase criticality. The selenium inside acts like the boron, but instead of holding it for the sake of slowing a reaction, it's used to store the energy like a lithium ion cell. The selenium's atomic structure can hold PKE much like rechargeable batteries." Eduardo looked to Dan's counterpart with an eyebrow up, "Geez, I didn't understand a word of that."

Kylie was beyond impressed, her walking beside Dan, "Wow, being a jerk aside, your doppelganger is a genius!"

Old Man Dan scoffed, "'Genius' nothing. This is a known phenomenon throughout GBI."

Mina, Serena, and Eduardo asked in unison, "GBI?"

"Ghostbusters International" the old man explained, "the main company that handles all Ghostbusters offices around the world. We have 368 operating offices world wide, about 150 of those in the United States alone, all with on site Ecto-Containment systems. I'm the co-founding member of Ghostbusters: Chicago Division, and I've been it's chief engineer for 20 years. All the stuff the original team did is common knowledge in the company," He then had a look like he was just having something occur to him, "In 550 Central Park West, the cap was built in a way to release the energy once it hit saturation, allowing Gozer to come through," he looked to Egon, "I know the building was built in a way to make it a slow accumulation. Why would anyone put this control box thing together with Shandor's Composite? Wouldn't that make the structure ridiculously unstable?"

"You mean, concentrate energy in one spot?" Old Man Dan looked back to the voice to see Amy looking very very apprehended. She knew something that wasn't being explained. The old grizzled engineer knew that look too well, but went ahead anyway, "Yes. From the sound of it, this thing has another purpose then just trapping that lindworm thing. For what…" Amy turned away and looked at the two other girls and Darien. She then looked back to Egon and Dan. There was some kind of conversation taking place with these people, and no words were being exchanged. It didn't sit right.

The building thumped. Everyone looked around as a flurry of noise started looming over the building. Everyone in the building started looking around the lab, Serena speaking aloud, "W-what was that?" The building's alarm went off causing everyone to scramble to the fire poles.

Once down stairs, they all saw Janine by the main door. She heard people coming down the poles and turned to them, "We got company!" Coming to the door, everyone saw the flying monsters zooming about in the sky. Old Man Dan especially saw this, "Oh shit. You have these assholes here, too?"

"All of our equipment is in Ecto-1!" Roland shouted, "We left the car outside because the Explorer was in our way!" "Like that matters!" Eduardo stated as he unhooked his thrower, "The packs are useless!" Old Man Dan looked at Eduardo, "You mean you guys haven't figured out their frequency?" "That's exactly what I'm saying idiota!" the old engineer marched over to Eduardo quickly causing him to flinch. He snagged the thrower from the man's hand, took a screwdriver from his shoulder sleeve pocket, and started adjusting the fine-tune potentiometer on the device. He then promptly dropped the gun back into the hispanic man's hands and grabbed him by the front of his shirt, "Come on, Cheech, you're coming with me!"

"Where we goin'?!"

"To my truck!" Eduardo pulled free as he watched the man step outside the main doors into the rain toward the Ford Explorer parked on the curb. The beasts started flying toward him as he walked to the back tailgate of the vehicle. Dan watched as his other self approached the vehicle as the monsters approached him, "Are you fucking insane?"

Just as he approached the back of the truck, a Man-Bat creature dropped in front of him and raised it's claws. Old Man dan promptly pulled the large pistol-like device from his belt, "Fuck you!" Pulling the trigger, a hole was blasted clean through the beast's chest, it falling to the ground soon after. Another dropped behind that monster causing Old Man Dan to pistol whip the beast across the face, then used the bottom of the gun's grip to knock it down before also blowing a hole through the monster's head. He spit on the creature, "Fuck you, too!" holstering the pistol, he opened the tailgate to expose a single backpack along with a large device sitting next to it.

The backpack looked similar to the Mk. I Proton Packs, but with more exposed wiring and tubing. It had four lights on the cyclotron instead of three, but it also had a green tank attached to the side opposite of the thrower hook; it didn't have a spot for a ghost trap to hang like the original packs. It was black and menacing. Old Man Dan strapped the device on and pulled the thrower, it firing up with the exact same whir their packs made. It was, indeed, another dimension's version of a Proton Pack.

On the gun beside the main thrower barrel was a small silver cylinder with a cone shaped tip. Along the cord of the thrower was another clear tube filled with what looked like green slime connected to the tube. Creatures started diving for the man as he began to take aim, "Follow me here, huh? Fine. Suck Carbon-14, you sons-of-bitches!" He opened fire and grabbed one of the beasts with the stream, holding it in place.

The other beasts slammed into the first caught in the stream and suddenly became trapped in the beam themselves, all of the bodies of the creatures becoming stuck together like a line of magnets. He yanked the thrower upward causing the beasts to get pulled into the air, then using his free hand, adjusted the beam to shorten, then soon after pulled the thrower downward. The mass of creatures accelerated toward the ground and slammed into the street, all of them giving a wet, noisy CRUNCH as they hit the ground.

Everyone stood in awe as he performed before them. Kylie was beside herself, "Woah! Look at how many he took out by himself!"

"How did he find the frequency?" Roland stated, "Even with days of trial and error we couldn't find it!"

Egon quickly thought about what was happening around them, then turned to Eduardo, "Eduardo, go out there and help him. If he knows how to beat these creatures, he adjusted your pack to do the same. Go!" Eduardo looked back out and saw the older man attacking the beasts again, him throwing another grouped mass of creatures against the side of a building. He gripped his thrower, "Alright, you fugly nightmares! You're toast!"

Opening fire, the first beast caught in his beam attempted to pull free by trying to fly away, knocking him down, pulling him across the driveway to the firehouse, and into the street. He yelled in surprise as the beast dragged him across the pavement. Old Man Dan saw this and yelled out, "You need to plant your feet, you moron!" He swept his beam across and grabbed the beast that dragged Eduardo around. After the beast was under Old Man Dan's grip, Eduardo managed to stand up while keeping his beam active, "Hey, I had him under control!"

"You were recreating the water skiing scene in 'The Great Outdoors'!" he belted, "Any more John Candy-like horseplay and I'll kill ya!"

By this time, the creature levels decreased enough to make Dan run to his truck, and make Egon, Kylie, and Roland run to the Ecto-1 for packs. After getting them on, Egon called out, "What frequency are you tuned to?" Over the fire Old Man Dan responded, "347,884 MegaHertz and a phase of 1.662 Gigacycles! They're just slightly out of phase!" Everyone adjusted their packs accordingly and began firing at the creatures. Roland was especially relieved when he grabbed a beast with his stream and threw it across the neighborhood, "I never thought I would be so satisfied to actually affect something!"

"It doesn't last!" Old Man Dan stated aloud, "When they come in an endless torrent, the novelty wears off." he looked back to the still open hatch of the Explorer, "Hold the line; I got something for these little fuckers!" He powered down, clipped his gun to his belt, and ran back to the SUV. He started pulling the device from the rear. It looked like a propane fuel cylinder from on the back of a forklift with a recessed beacon light on top and a control box on the side. He placed the device on the ground and threw out a tripod-like set of legs to stabilize the canister then activated the control box on the side of the unit.

Mina turned to Amy and asked, "Shouldn't we transform and help?" Amy looked to her computer again and saw what was happening with the device, "We may not need to!"

The beacon light started to flash on the device as what looked like electrical insulators extended under the light out of the cylinder housing. It rose up quickly like a telescoping radio antenna as a crackling sound began emanating from the unit. Old Man Dan detached what looked almost like a foot pedal similar to an older Ghost Trap's from the side of the device and put it on the ground, holding his foot down on it. He then pulled his thrower off his belt and rejoined the fight, "Protect me and this device. It has to have close human contact to properly activate it."

Kylie looked away from where she was firing to see the device, "What is that thing?"

"I'll show ya!" he said as he looked at the display, "96%... 98… 99… Charged!"

From under the red flashing beacon light, a set of four flat antenne extended out like an umbrella as a blue pulse of light flashed. The pulse of light flashed upward into the sky and spread along the ground like a sphere of energy. It covered the firehouse and some of the surrounding area, the energy wave pushing the Man-Bats further and further away from the building. The creatures were ripped away from the proton streams and just outside, some of them trying to fly back toward the Ghostbusters in the street, but bouncing off of the shimmering energy barrier that now enclosed the Ghostbusters' headquarters.

Everyone shut down their throwers and saw the creatures being repelled off the shield. Eduardo stepped up and yelled at the beasts, "That's right! Don't go messin' with scientists!"

Dan walked up to his other self and grabbed him by the front of his suit, "What the fuck is the matter with you? Don't you have enough sense not to go walking out in the middle of an obvious onslaught?" Old Man Dan knocked his younger image's hands off him, soon after pointing his finger in his face and yelling at him, "Let's get one thing straight, dickhead: You may look like me, but we are nothing alike! I've been fighting these things long enough to be able to do it in my sleep, and considering how much sleep I do get is not far from the truth!"

Dan fired back, "I'm in command of this field team! I've been running it for two and a half years, and I know better…"

Old Man Dan interrupted him, "I've been running operations for twenty" Lightning flashed as the old man's expression intensified, " I skipped grades and graduated top of DeVry; I was barely able to drive and had my team accepted into GBI! I was handling nuclear material before I was old enough to have a proper NRC license! I've personally logged over 1,500 ectoplasmic entities in a containment system of my own design before I could have one drop of liquor! I got more experience in one ass hair than you will in the next fifty lifetimes!"

Dan was stunned. He wanted to talk back. He wanted badly to cut the man with words, but he had nothing. In the cold wet of the morning storm, all he could say was this, "You're right: We're nothing alike. I could never be this cold-hearted." The older man turned to the firehouse doors. There was a sound of silence only broken by the pattering of rain against the puddles in the street. He took a deep breath and stated calmly, "You watch a bunch of kids die in a fire and keep your soul. You watch as the woman you love dies in your arms from a circumstance of your making and see how happy you are with yourself. My cold heart is the only thing that gives me the ability to strike these things down." Thunder rumbled, punctuating the man's statement.

It bothered Dan. Here was a version of himself saying he has seen horrors he himself hasn't seen. When he mentioned a woman he loved dying in his arms...

Old Man Dan began walking back in as Garrett and Raye started rushing toward the door. Garrett stopped short of Old Man Dan mistaking him for his dimension's version, "We heard the alarm go off, so we decided to watch after Lita. What happened?" Old Man Dan looked at the man before him in the wheelchair and noticed the Proton Pack on his back. He looked behind him, "Who the fuck let the retard in the organisation?"

Offended, Garrett responded harshly, "Retard?! You may be pissed at me, but you have no right to insult me like that, especially when you drink most of your water out of the toilet!"

Old Man Dan looked back toward Garrett as his eyes went wide as a look of pure psychosis etched on his face. He grunted loudly and kicked Garrett into the chest so hard his chair's back wheels stayed stationary as his chair pivoted backwards, slamming him into the ground on his back. The old engineer quickly walked up and stomped on Garrett's chest knocking the wind out of him, causing everyone in his presence to gasp in horror. Garrett - left rolling in his chair from side to side trying to breathe - was tended to by Raye. She looked up to him angry when she noticed something.

There was a strange glow around the man; an aura. It wasn't natural. When he noticed her leering at him, he grunted again, "You got something to say? Huh?" When she didn't respond, he walked into the firehouse and toward the stairs.

Dan rushed over and went to check on Garrett. Raye looked back and saw Dan there, jumping in terror. He rolled Garrett to face him, "Hey, Garrett, you okay?" Still trying to breathe, Garrett looked up and saw him hanging over him. Using the momentum of rolling himself to his other side, he punched Dan across the mouth. Dan almost fell to his side when he caught himself. He looked back down and was about to strangle the man when Roland and Darien grabbed him by the arms, pulling him up, and holding him back. After a moment to calm down, he rubbed his jaw, "Me and my imperfect image have at least one thing in common; we both think Garrett's an asshole."