Egon could feel his heart beating in his throat.
"Oh no…" he thought, "Another confession? Isn't everyone going through enough emotional turmoil as it is?"
"What is it, Gabby?" asked Ray.
"I was the one who summoned the demon that terrorized Spanish Harlem six weeks ago," said Gabby. She figured that, since she was being open about one dirty secret, there was no holding back on the others.
"You summoned the Class-Six Acid Spewer?!" asked Egon. He didn't mean for his voice to raise but he couldn't help it.
"You did that?!" asked Ray. "Wow! That's amazing!"
"Ray, are you honestly encouraging her?!"
Ray turned to Egon and away from the guilt-stricken Gabby. "No, I'm not, Egon. I just can't believe that someone like Gabby could summon something so powerful and destructive."
Gabby sunk in her seat. She was clearly more affected by how Egon was reacting than how Ray was reacting.
"I didn't mean to…" she said.
"How did you do it?" asked Winston.
"What I did was I went to an esoteric bookstore in Greenwich Village…"
"Was it Dolores' Books and Knick-Knacks?" asked Ray, "I love that place!"
"Ray, let her finish her story," said Egon.
"Yes, it was that place," continued Gabby. "I went to the bookstore and bought a spell book. You see, Egon was struggling to figure out the reason why sleep paralysis demons were attacking people and, at the time, I wasn't yet working as his assistant. I wanted to help in my own way, so I tried to use my magic to summon a sleep paralysis demon myself in my own home so I could capture it in a cage and bring it to you. So, I set up the ritual and… it did not go as planned. It escaped my house and I guess the rest is history."
Egon was not a happy camper when he heard this. That dastardly thing that brought destruction everywhere it went with its blade feet and acid breath; its squawks that could be heard from several neighborhoods over. It was something that Egon got out of bed for and now he knew that its rampage could have been prevented by one of his coworkers being more careful.
"What you did was very irresponsible," said Egon, "You singlehandedly caused thousands of dollars in damage with the demon you let loose. Do you realize that? You should feel awfully lucky that nobody got hurt." This scolding was all too necessary. He didn't necessarily like expressing his anger, but he figured that this was good practice for when he had to discipline Casey someday.
"I know, I know," wined Gabby, "I tried something that was far too advanced and risky for a magical practitioner like me and we all paid for it. In my case, I paid for it with my blood." She then showed everyone the scar on the palm of her right hand from when she carved into it for the ritual.
"Hey, look on the bright side," said Peter, "That'll make an interesting story. Behind every scar is an interesting story."
"Well, I'll have you know that it won't happen again. In fact, I will probably burn the book that I got that ritual from."
"Don't do that!" said Ray, "It's probably a collectable!"
Egon figured that these strong feelings weren't going to help him in the rest of this conversation. He closed his eyes and took some deep, cleansing breaths.
"So, as I understand, you did all this so that you can trap an alp in a cage?" asked Egon.
"Yes," said Gabby, "I would have done that while still keeping my magic a secret."
"There's a reason why we don't trap ghosts in cages," said Winston.
"Well, spirits can be rather… confusing. Some can phase through walls while others are solid and can be touched. And then there's Slimer who can somehow phase through walls AND eat things. I said that I knew quite a bit about spirits but they still have their secrets."
"In case you were wondering, the physical properties of spirits are dependent on a diverse array of factors ranging from the type of spirit to the temperature of the environment to how that spirit is feeling at that particular moment," said Egon, "I wrote a research paper explaining all about this if you're interested."
"No thank you," said Gabby, "I'm not in an academic mood at the moment."
"Well, since we now know that you can summon Class-Six ghosts, we could really use that," said Ray.
"I summoned that by accident, though."
"Maybe you just need some practice."
"What she does need is supervision," said Egon, "If she were to help us with her magic, we need to stand around to prevent a potential disaster."
Gabby sunk back into her chair, wilting and presenting as a discouraged puppy-dog. Egon looked forward to seeing her magical powers but felt fearful both for her and OF her. This woman was previously his underling. Now, he saw her as a being more powerful than he could imagine, someone with so much to teach the others. On the other hand, he wasn't quite sure he could trust the others with magic, either. Maybe magic was better off being within her domain.
"And speaking of potential disasters, I think someone owes Gabby an apology," said Egon.
Peter sighed.
"Listen, Gabs," he said, "I'm sorry for the way I've been treating you. From now on, I'm going to take what you say seriously and I will try not to treat you as less than what you are."
Gabby looked at Peter for a few seconds and smiled.
"I accept your apology," she said.
"Hey, if someone like you can bring disasters, then you'd be just about an even match for anything else disastrous that we will be fighting in the future!"
"Now that you mention that, I think it's about time that I told you guys what I found out about the nightmare demons."
Egon found himself hanging onto her words again. This woman was just full of surprises.
"You know something about the nightmare demons?" he asked, "Please don't spare us the details."
"Do you remember that ghost friend I mentioned?"
"Yes."
"Well, she's been doing intel for the past few months and she found out that the nightmare demons have been eating people's nightmares and transforming into them in order to help a witch take over New York City. This witch has been going into the demon realm and training up this army of demons."
The others around the table stiffened in shock. Ray gasped. This entire time, Gabby desired to be listened to and, in this case, she was glad she was.
"Are you serious?" asked Winston.
"Unfortunately, yes. I may have said that most witches aren't evil but evil witches do exist."
Egon was prepared to not believe something like this… but this was the part of his job where the rational side of him that was trained up from his school days was forced to take a holiday. He lived in a crazy, mixed-up world where anybody anything said had a good chance of being true, whether that's a mystery solved by someone else or the conspiracy theory du jour.
"If this is true, then I haven't been able to deduce any of this from my studies or experiments," said Egon.
"Yes," said Gabby, "And I have managed to deduce it from my magical practice."
Egon couldn't really focus on the grand truth about the nightmare demons. Now, he was feeling that same feeling of heaviness and smallness that he felt whenever his Uncle Cyrus berated him about his line of work. He was feeling insecurity. This young woman with fewer credentials than him had figured something out before he did. No matter. He was great at hiding his feelings. He especially wanted to hide THESE feelings. Nobody had to know about them.
"Well, I commend you for doing your research, Gabby," said Egon.
"For the next few days, my parents will be at a shoe convention, so I can have you guys over so you can meet Gertrude," said Gabby, "She would enjoy the company."
"She sounds like an important person to have at a time like this."
"Oh, believe me, she is."
By now, Egon had enough of people. He just wanted to go to his lab for a bit. As long as she phoned Janine and told her that he would be home later, she wouldn't mind.
Later, Egon was on the roof assembling the prototype of the new proton pack. Today was finally the day. He didn't have to wait until Wednesday night to start on this. This work-related emergency brought him to The Firehouse early that week. He made sure that his paperweight was keeping the blueprints and equations from flying into the city. The breeze on the roof was reassuring, as if it reminded him that the universe was working as usual. He got a strange thrill out of working with unstable material such as protons.
Speaking of unstable…
Gabby found her way to the rooftop, making sure to close the door behind her. Egon didn't know it was her until she spoke up.
"Egon?" she said.
Egon tensed up. He had been deep into his project as usual, not aware of the rest of the world until someone spoke his name.
"Yes, Gabby?" he said.
"I just wanted to say that now that you know of my magic, I would be interested in using it to help you directly. If we combined the forces of science and magic, I'm sure The Ghostbusters can be quite the force to be reckoned with."
Egon couldn't help but sigh. He felt as though magic was a tainting force on his work. What kind of science journal would take him seriously if he worked with a witch?
"Gabby, you presented a good idea just now and I'm looking forward to seeing examples of your magical power… but I have mixed feelings about taking advantage of it."
"Oh? Are you afraid of it in the same way Peter was?"
"No, it's not that. Believe me, after all I've been through, it takes a lot to scare me. It's just that I've gotten so far using scientific methods that using a force like magic would seem like… I don't know… cheating."
"How would it be cheating, exactly?"
"From what I do know about magic, it's basically saying words and having things appear out of thin air. It's effortless. It takes the fun and challenge out of figuring things out with the materials you need to allocate and the knowledge you need to acquire. Humanity didn't get this far with magic."
"Well, I'll have you know that magic is anything but easy. It's not just saying words and pointing at things. It takes a lot of mental energy to cast a spell. In fact, it takes energy of all kinds. In order to manifest something, you have to visualize as many aspects of it as you can to the best of your ability. The reason my first attempt at summoning an alp didn't go so well was because I was not familiar enough with them. Also, I was distracted by a pair of fuzzy dice I saw that day."
"Hmm… that is interesting. That just goes to show you how little I know about magic."
"Part of the reason I studied physics is because a spell is far more likely to be successful if you know how the universe works. Even if magic is a shortcut like you said, I think we need all the shortcuts we can get. That witch is planning "The Ruckus" soon and we still need to find out what exactly that is. If you think about it, science and magic do have their similarities. Your proton pack right there started out as an idea, which you transferred to paper in the form of equations, notes and drawings. Now, you're manifesting it as something real."
Egon knew that he had to swallow his pride and integrate magic into his experiments. After all, it made sense to use magic to defeat a magic-user.
"Yes… you're right," said Egon as he put down his screwdriver, "I need to open my mind a little more. We should consult that ghost friend of yours and see if she can give us any leads about this evil witch."
"Unfortunately, she can no longer spy on the demons. They caught her and she just barely escaped with her… um… not life."
"But that doesn't mean that WE can't spy on the demons. We've traveled to other realms before. I have devices that can spy on these creatures without any of us having to be there."
Gabby perked up. She looked hopeful.
"Meanwhile, I can assemble this proton pack and maybe you can figure out a way to use your magic duplicate it."
"I can certainly try. I mean… yes. I will do that!"
"This means that I will have to come into work for the rest of the week. You don't mind if I bring the baby, do you?"
"As long as you keep Fireball far away from the experiments, I'm fine with that. I'm sure he would like the change of scenery. Now, before I forget, I need to head to a bakery in my neighborhood. I owe Slimer some pastries."