Rescue the Past

by Sheila Paulson

"You're not gonna use that thing again, are you?" Peter Venkman asked in dismay as he walked into the first floor lab at Ghostbuster Central and got a look at what his three buddies were doing. "Come on, Egon, last time you played with it, a demon took over your body and your soul got to be a trampoline in an alternate dimension. That thing is dangerous." The device in question didn't look particularly dangerous; just a huge screen like a big-screen TV, but with an empty space rather than a glassed in-front, set atop a huge control panel. It resembled a gizmo out of a b-movie science lab, rather than a machine that had caused a major crisis.

Egon Spengler looked up from the control panel of the transfer portal. He was wearing a magnifying lens over his left eye, and the sight of the eye, hugely magnified, was a little eerie. Talk about your bug-eyed monster. "That was not the fault of the dimensionometer, Peter. It was the fault of those investigative reporters who tampered with the controls." When Peter arched a skeptical brow, Egon turned to his partner in 'crime' and urged, "Tell him, Ray."

"Gee, yeah." Ray Stantz beamed. "It was because that of reporter from 20/40/60. The containment unit is getting awfully cramped. We've sure been busy lately. We can use this to send the ghosts into distant dimensions so they can't get back to New York."

The fourth member of the Ghostbusters, Winston Zeddemore, caught Peter's eye and grinned sympathetically. "I don't blame you, Pete. I don't like the thing myself, but I figured if these two mad scientists were going to mess with it, they needed somebody sensible to keep an eye on them, so I've been hanging over their shoulders all evening."

"Thanks, Winston," said Peter fervently. "The minute I turn my back, Ray here is all gung ho to do something dangerous, and old Spengs gets so caught up in his work he wouldn't take shelter if we had a tornado warning."

Egon looked down his nose at him. "Tornadoes are extremely rare in New York."

"A fact for which I am profoundly grateful," Peter came back. "Just think what would happen if a tornado hit the containment unit. We'd have to bust all these spooks and nasties all over again. Wouldn't be fun." He peered over Egon's shoulder. "So what's on the agenda, big guy? Tell me this thing isn't ready for a test."

"I could tell you that, Peter, but that would be lying. It's ready, and we've already done the first test, that Class 5 we captured this morning. Someone forgot to store it in the containment unit, Peter."

"I didn't forget," Peter defended himself. "I just hadn't done it yet."

Ray bounced on his toes. "It worked great. You should have seen it. It just zipped right into the field, no trouble at all. We got lots of readings. There wasn't the slightest problem."

"You're just in time for the second test," Egon explained. "We're going to use the demon we caught this afternoon.

"So who forgot to put that one in the trap?" Peter couldn't resist the question. Okay, so he'd forgotten the Class 5, but he would have remembered eventually. Traps held ghosts of that level indefinitely.

"I didn't forget," Egon defended himself. "I left it out deliberately. I wanted to do the testing this evening, and that particular spirit would be better away from the containment unit."

"Keeping secrets, Spengs?"

"No, of course not." But Egon's eyes shifted. It wasn't so much a secret as something he'd been determined to do.

Peter rolled his eyes at Winston, who shrugged. "I couldn't stop 'em," he muttered under his breath.

"Boy, was it a nasty one." Ray bounced a little. He loved the tough jobs. When they had handed out optimism, he'd received his own share and that of the next ten people in line. "Just think, Peter, how malicious he was. He could cause trouble in the containment unit, agitate all the other ghosts. Better to keep him out of there."

Peter had to give him that. The demon had hurt three people before the Ghostbusters had arrived on the scene. It had flung several automobiles into other cars and caused a major traffic pile-up--literally. The huge, scaly spirit had the ability to phase in and out, one minute behind Egon, the next across the street, then high in the sky ready to dive-bomb them. Ray had later claimed he thought it was making minute time shifts. Keeping a time-shifting demon away from the containment unit might be good, but the last time there had been a demon in proximity with Egon's dimensionometer, all hell had broken loose.

Peter had known the job would be tough when he'd dreamed it up, but he didn't see any point in looking for ways to make it tougher. He ran an impatient hand through his brown thatch, then tried surreptitiously to straighten it.

"Are you guys sure about this?" If only he hadn't gone on a date tonight, he might have reined them in. Not that the date had been one of his more successful efforts. That's why he was home so early.

Still, look at Ray and Egon. They were having a riot. Different strokes and all that, but he had to wonder about his best buddies. He wouldn't have them any other way--but he'd like to have them safer.

"Everything checks out, Peter. It worked perfectly on the Class 5." Egon looked calm and in control. You couldn't always tell with Egon, not unless you looked him dead in the eye, or had known him for almost fifteen years, like Peter had. He could tell that Egon believed he had repaired the portal. That meant he probably had. He wasn't an optimist who believed things because he wanted to. That was more Ray's gig, which reminded him. "You didn't let Ray wire this thing, did you?"

Ray pretended hurt. "We worked from Egon's schematics, Peter. Besides, if you can't trust an engineer to build something, who can you trust?"

"Winston." Peter slung his arm around Zeddemore's shoulders. "Think it's okay?"

"Well, it did work before that jerk reporter messed with it, and it worked even better just now. I say we go for it. I'd like to have that demon on another planet."

Obligingly, Ray held the full trap in front of the portal. The screen was inactive; they could see right through it to the wall behind.

Egon pulled the control lever. "Activating now." The device hummed to life. As power spread and ran around the corners of the portal in a glow of visible light, Ray dropped the trap's trigger to the floor and stood with his foot beside it, ready to release the entity once the field opened. Peter crossed his fingers. Maybe he'd feel better if he'd been here for the first test.

The screen glowed as the power coalesced, revealing the familiar, desolate landscape of the dimension where Egon's soul had once been banished. Peter shivered in reminiscence. That had not been his favorite vacation spot. He liked Siberia better. Or even Cleveland.

"Transferring, now." Egon nodded, and Ray stomped on the trigger, the trap's opening aimed right at the portal. The demon shot out of the mini-containment, still confined in its glowing field. Anger filled the nearly-human face, a boiling rage that made Peter wish he was wearing a proton pack and had his thrower aimed at the entity. Winston did, but it might not be enough if the demon got loose. It twisted around and saw them and hatred filled its face. With a shake of its head, it shot out a forked tongue and licked its lips suggestively. Its horns glistened in the brilliant glow from the trap.

The demon slid toward the portal and hung between the two fields, struggling wildly. Peter braced himself. "Shut down, Ray," Egon cried and Ray yanked his foot off the pedal. The trap slammed shut and the portal's field suction took over. The demon writhed in the opening, its face dark and nasty. Abruptly, it raised its hands and cast fire at Egon, who ducked, even though the suction prevented the flames from striking him. Then, before their eyes, the demon vanished without a trace. It didn't look to Peter like it had been sucked through the portal at all.

"I've got a bad feeling about this." He looked around for a proton pack. There was one over on the pool table in the corner. He had just started toward it when everything went wrong.

Energy punched forward into the room like a controlled explosion, full of sound and movement, yells and crashes, and for an instant, Peter got a confused view of a group of men in what looked like this very room, only somehow different. Rows of fire hoses hung on a rack on the wall behind them and most of the men wore firemen's uniforms. Mouths agape, they stared at the Ghostbusters blankly, then erupted into panicked yells as the demon materialized and flew at them. A second later, the two men who were nearest to the screen, both in civilian clothes, were sucked through the portal at them in a mid-air dive. The dark-haired one hit Egon right in the stomach, which drove his breath out in a whoosh. He fell backward, and his head impacted against the frame of the pool table. The dark haired man landed on top of him. The lighter-haired stranger got tangled up with Winston, who tried to brace himself without much success. Both of them crashed into Peter, who staggered sideways and all three of them went down like ninepins.

Ray lunged for the portal controls; but, before he could reach them, the device shorted out in a spectacular burst of sparks and the sizzle of fried wiring. The other room disappeared without a trace, and Peter could see the familiar, hoseless wall through the smoke that hung in the air. Too late, Ray flipped the switch, then he grabbed up a P.K.E. meter and took urgent readings. Half squished beneath Winston and the stranger, Peter couldn't hear the detection device react. The demon was gone--somewhere. Somewhen maybe?

Groggy and confused, Egon lay half buried beneath the lean, brown-haired man. When everybody else started sorting themselves out, he didn't move.

"EGON!" Peter shouted.

"He hit his head." The man who had knocked the blond down shook his own head to clear it, disarraying his dark locks, then he sat back on his heels and felt for Egon's pulse. He looked like he knew exactly what he was doing. Egon glanced at the stranger in mild surprise but didn't speak.

"What the heck was that?" the other stranger asked. His eyes looked blank and doubtful. What had happened to him was so far outside his realm of experience that he hadn't started to process it yet.

"We've got a man down," his friend replied. "Get over here, Roy. He took a hard blow to the head."

"Where are we, Johnny?" Roy asked, frowning.

Johnny shook his head. Peter got the feeling that it was easier for him to focus on the injured Egon than to confront the reality of his presence in an unfamiliar place. "Worry about that later. This guy needs us. I wish we had our equipment." He started to count Egon's respiration.

"Equipment?" Winston hauled himself off Peter, who tried to reacquaint his lungs with the concept of breathing. He suspected he would be black and blue all over by morning. Ignoring that, he scrambled over to Egon while Winston grabbed a fire extinguisher and headed for the dimensionometer.

"Come on, Egon, wake up," Peter urged. Egon's eyes tracked in Peter's direction, but his gaze held no real awareness.

"Come on, come on." The dark haired man touched Egon's shoulder to regain his attention. "I want you to follow my finger." He moved it slowly back and forth in front of Egon's eyes. Egon watched it obediently. Just dazed, Peter insisted to himself. He'll be okay in a minute.

"Spengs? Talk to me."

"They're human," Ray blurted out. "I'm getting normal human biorhythms." He put aside the meter he'd been aiming at the two strangers, and joined Peter at Egon's side. "How is he?"

Mouth hanging open, Johnny stared at Stantz then shared a doubtful glance with his friend. All the while, he kept checking Egon out. He looked like he knew what he was doing and Peter was glad of that. Egon's face cleared slowly and questions slid into his eyes.

"Human biorhythms?" Roy echoed as he knelt to join in the exam. "I know what biorhythms are, but human? What else would we be? And what was that thing we saw for a minute?"

"I'm sorry, but you got caught in a lab accident," Winston said practically. He set aside the fire extinguisher and came back. "Don't worry about it for now. What's wrong with Egon?"

"He hit his head pretty hard," said Johnny. "His pupils are equal and reactive, and his pulse and respiration are normal. He's not unconscious, just a little momentary confusion. I'm not sure where we are, but you do have a paramedic program here, don't you?"

"Yeah, should we call them?"

"We're fireman paramedics," Roy explained. "Any of the rest of you hurt?"

When Peter, Ray and Winston shook their heads, he turned his attention to Egon, who was starting to move more purposefully. Johnny put his hand on Egon's chest. "No, don't try to get up yet. Let us finish checking you out."

Egon struggled against the grip. "Guys?"

Ray broke into a huge grin. "He's back!"

"Calm down," Johnny soothed. "Easy, easy." His voice and whole bearing changed and he sounded so composed that Peter would have relaxed himself if it weren't for the sight of his downed friend. "Let us check you out."

"Listen to the paramedic, Egon," Winston instructed so firmly that Egon reacted to it.

"Paramedic?" He blinked at Johnny. "Surely I wasn't unconscious long enough for paramedics to arrive. Besides, they aren't wearing paramedic uniforms."

He had a point. The other guys they had seen through the portal had been dressed as firemen, but these characters were in civvies. Out of date civvies if it came to that. The cut of Johnny's jeans looked like something Peter had worn about ten years ago. Had Ray been right about the demon and time travel? Were these two guys the victims of a temporal accident?

Ignoring the fashion question, Peter looked down at Egon. "Hey, Spengs, you okay?"

Johnny continued his examination. "Pupils still equal and reactive, pulse and respiration still normal. I don't have a blood-pressure cuff so I can't check his blood pressure." He turned back to Egon. "You didn't really lose consciousness at all; I think you were just momentarily dazed."

"I feel all right," Egon replied. "My head is sore, back here." He felt for the spot where it had impacted the pool table. "But my vision's normal and I don't feel sick. I don't think I have a concussion."

"It's possible you have a slight one, so don't try to move suddenly," said Roy. "We'll let you sit up, but if you feel any lightheadedness or experience any double vision, tell us."

"I will." Egon sat up while Johnny steadied him, his eyes narrowed as he studied the blond's reactions. "I don't feel dizzy," the physicist admitted. "I think I'm fine."

Egon stood up and turned his eyes to the portal. Peter studied him to be sure he wasn't acting better than he really was. If he were interested enough in the phenomenon at hand, he was entirely capable of ignoring gaping wounds. The fireman paramedic hovered right at his side, an unobtrusive hand at his elbow just in case. But Johnny was right; his eyes were clear and he seemed alert. "Ray? What happened to the demon?"

"Gosh, Egon, I think it might have resisted the transfer suction long enough to phase into another time. It must be able to zip in and out with a lot wider range than we even dreamed of, or maybe it could use the portal's energy to boost its range. You saw it, didn't you? The same room as here, only there were fire hoses hung on racks and firemen there. I think it opened a doorway between our time and a time when the firehouse was still officially a firehouse--and that was years ago."

"Wait a minute, what are you saying?" Roy shifted automatically closer to Johnny. His eyes narrowed and filled with suspicion.

Johnny arched an eyebrow to suggest he suspected his leg were being pulled. "They're talking about time travel. If we were home, I'd say this was one of Chet's more elaborate gags. I'm not sure it's not. A big special lights show...."

"I hardly think Chet could arrange anything this elaborate," Roy objected. "And I don't think he'd pull a prank where someone could get hurt. Where are we? Or, should I say, when are we?"

Uh oh, Peter, the psychologist, thought, he sounds far too calm.

"October 10th, 1988," explained Ray promptly. "Where did you come from?"

Roy and Johnny goggled at each other in utter disbelief. "This is crazy," insisted Roy. "It's got to be. It's October 10th, all right, but it's 1976." He glanced uneasily over his shoulder. "This is still New York, right? We're still at the firehouse."

"Yes, it's New York," Winston reassured them. "Why were you at the firehouse?"

"We were here to study the local EMS program," Roy explained. "We're paramedics in Los Angeles. Our paramedic program runs through the fire department. It's different here--your EMS Service is independent of the FDNY--but we stopped in at the firehouse anyway. Marco--one of the guys on our shift back home--has a cousin who's a fireman so we dropped in to say hi." He eyed the room oddly. "We were getting a tour, checking out their supplies and equipment. This looks like the same room--but it's different."

"There's got to be an explanation," Johnny objected. "Something went haywire and there was an explosion and we're still unconscious or delirious. Or maybe there was a gas leak, made us feel high, like a bad trip or something." He took his own pulse just to be sure and frowned at his results. "We can't be in the future. Maybe it's a hoax. You know, the guys at the station putting us on. Maybe Marco called his cousin and they set us up." His eyes scanned the room. "But this looks like it might be the same room. Only I don't see how they could have got the hoses out so fast and brought in all this other stuff. And, if it was a prank, they wouldn't have knocked us out or drugged us--or hurt this guy." He waved his hand at Egon, finally running out of words.

"Come out and see the rest of the place," Ray said. "When we started our business, we bought this place. It used to be a firehouse. We even use the firepoles when we have to go on a quick bust."

"A bust?" asked Roy.

"Sure. We're the Ghostbusters."

Roy and Johnny exchanged a doubtful glance. This time both of them looked as if they were being conned. "Ghostbusters?" Roy ventured. "Was that thing we saw for a second a ghost?"

"Come on, Roy, you don't believe in ghosts, do you?" Johnny reached out and felt his friend's forehead to check for fever. "We must have been hit on the head. That explains it all. We're probably unconscious and this is a dream. It's gotta be. Any minute now we'll wake up and everything'll be normal."

Roy frowned. "Twelve years. If it is 1988, that means we've been missing for twelve years."

Gage's face mirrored the frown. "Ghostbusters--time travel? No way. You're actors! That's it."

Ray looked sympathetic. ""You really are in 1988. There was an accident and you're not unconscious. You...uh...traveled through time." He looked at the other Ghostbusters for help. Just how did you tell someone they'd been displaced through time because of an experiment involving a demon.

Peter took up the introductions. "We'll figure it out, and a way to get you back to 1976, too. We're good at things like that. I'm Peter Venkman. And this is Ray Stantz, and Winston Zeddemore, and the one you were checking out is Egon Spengler. Welcome to 1988."

Johnny turned a doubtful gaze upon Egon. Maybe he'd never met anyone named that before--or maybe he was just reacting to Egon's unlikely haircut. Then he shrugged and went with the flow. "I'm John Gage and this is my partner, Roy DeSoto. And, man, do I wish I was back home in L.A. right now. What kind of line are you trying to make us swallow? This is some kind of prank, isn't it? Chet dreamed it up and he got Marco to call his cousin and you rigged the whole thing. Where are the other guys? Hiding in the next room?" He edged toward the door. "That's probably a fake wall with the hoses right behind it. I betcha I'm right, Roy," he called over his shoulder. "I betcha I'm right."

He stalked out, pausing beside the gate to Peter's office and gazing at the room in front of him. It must have looked very different than it had in 1976, and no one would ever mistake the Ghostbusters' converted hearse, Ecto-1, for a fire truck. Johnny would be able to tell they were in the same building but, any second now, he'd realize no one would have been able to move those fire hoses in the time allowed, or run in the filing cabinets.

Or produce Slimer.

The team's ghostly mascot was hovering idly over Janine's desk, munching the remains of a bag of Cheetos. When they came out, the spud waved a casual hand at them, dripping green slime on Janine's blotter.

Involuntarily, Johnny took two steps backward and collided with Roy. "What the heck is that? Roy, look at that thing! I never saw anything like that in my whole life. That's it. We are unconscious. Or--or dead." His eyes widened. "That's it, Roy, we've gotta be dead. There aren't things like that in our world, but there might be in the afterlife. There was an explosion and it killed us and here we are." His eyes never left Slimer and Peter saw his muscles tense in preparation for flight.

"Hey, Slimer," Ray said cheerfully. "He's only our tame ghost," he reassured the two paramedics. They might come from La La Land, but they probably hadn't seen any ghosts out there. Until the coming of Gozer weakened the walls between dimensions in the Tri-State area, ghosts like Slimer were uncommon. Now they were a dime a dozen, at least in the Big Apple. "Slimer, these two guys are paramedics."

Slimer shrieked. "Guys hurt?" He rolled his yellow eyes at them in alarm.

"No, we're not hurt. They time traveled to get here." Ray grinned. "Slimer, can you shift between times?"

"It can talk," blurted Johnny.

Johnny and Roy stood staring, mouths ajar. "We can't be dead." Roy pinched himself. "Because I felt that."

"Well, who says you won't have sensations in the afterlife?" Johnny ran his fingers through his already-tousled hair. "I just never thought we'd have our own bodies like this. I thought we'd drift around and play harps."

"Or shovel coal?" Roy kidded him.

"Are you kidding? A virtuous young man like myself? Come on, Roy, St. Peter's gonna be waiting for me at the Pearly Gates so he can shake my hand."

Roy wasn't listening. He'd spotted the telephone on Janine's desk. Braving Slimer, he edged up to it and snatched the receiver. Slimer hovered closer, interested, but Ray waved him back.

"Not now, Slimer."

"If it is twelve years later, my wife will know. She would have been told if I'm missing--or dead." Roy punched in numbers. Johnny edged up beside him as if he knew how important the call was. The two men stood waiting, then Roy froze and all color drained from his face.

"Roy? What is it, buddy? What's wrong?" Johnny grabbed the phone from his partner's nerveless hand and held it to his ear, repeating what he heard, "...disconnected and is no longer in service. If you feel you have reached this number in error...." He hung up abruptly turned to look at DeSoto. "Roy?"

"It's real, isn't it?" The other paramedic looked at Egon for confirmation--sensing somehow that he held the answers to this. "It isn't a dream or an hallucination."

"I wish it were," Egon replied. "But it needn't be hopeless. If we can repair the device and recreate the conditions of our experiment, we should be able to reverse the process."

Peter stared at him. Recreate the conditions of the test? Yeah, right. It wasn't as if New York was filled with time-traveling demons. Come to think of it, that one was probably in 1976 now. Maybe it could find the Ghostbusters when they were younger and unprepared and take them out one by one. Peter crossed mental fingers and hoped like mad that Mr. Time Travel was too dense to think of it.

Gage grabbed Roy by the shoulders. "Come on, Roy, all that means is that you could have moved or have a different number. It doesn't mean you never got home. You know it doesn't."

"Joanne and the kids...." Roy said. "They think I'm dead. They think I've been dead for twelve years...."

"Well, once we get back, it won't have happened," Johnny insisted. "Come on, you know about time travel."

"I know about time travel," Roy replied. "I remember that old show, The Time Tunnel. They keep jumping around to various times in history and they never got home."

"That's only TV. Besides, if the worst happens, at least you can find her. You can track her down. It's gonna be okay, Roy."

"And the kids'll be grown up and maybe she even married again. God, Johnny." He pulled free of his friend's grip and strode across the garage without even noticing Ecto-1. He opened the small door set into the bigger ones and stepped out into the night.

Ray gave a distressed cry and started after him.

Johnny caught him and shook his head. "No, let him go. Give him a few minutes. That's a big shock, and he just adores his family. Well, maybe not his mother-in-law, but his kids and his wife." He stared after his friend, his eyes full of concern.

"Hey, Marco, your cousin from New York is on the line." Captain Hank Stanley of L.A. Station 51 held out the phone to fireman Marco Lopez. "He sounds pretty upset about something."

Marco grabbed the phone, and Chet Kelly exchanged a doubtful glance with Mike Stoker. "You don't think there's a problem with Gage and DeSoto, do you?"

"Worried about Johnny, Chet?" Stoker kidded.

"Nah, I'm not worried. If anything, I'm worried about New York. Imagine what kind of trouble Gage could get into there. I knew the Chief shouldn't have sent them. Should have sent somebody like Mr. Straight Arrow Craig Brice."

Brice, who was one of the two paramedics filling in for Gage and DeSoto on their shift while they were in New York, shot a look of lofty disdain at Kelly. He never seemed to take such things personally. Maybe it was because he thought he was better than everyone else. Tito Rodriguez, a fairly new paramedic and his partner for the duration, repressed a grin of amusement. He had to work with Brice every day and probably didn't want to make it any worse.

"Hold it, Chet," Stoker warned as Marco's face changed. That didn't look good. Chet was silent now, trying to cover his concern. Worry about Gage? Nah, not him.

Marco asked a quick question. He'd slipped into Spanish, and the syllables rattled out too fast for Chet to follow. Marco lost color. So did Rodriguez, who was bilingual. Brice arched a questioning eyebrow at him, but he shook his head and gestured to wait.

Lopez scribbled down a phone number on the pad, said goodbye, and hung up.

"What was that about?" asked Captain Stanley. "Trouble for our guys in New York?"

"Yeah, Cap. Weird trouble. Johnny and Roy showed up like they'd planned to visit my cousin Gordy. They were getting a tour of the firehouse when...something strange happened."

"I knew it," Chet burst out. "Gage got in trouble, didn't he? Made us all look bad."

Lopez shook his head. "No, it wasn't like that, Chet. Nothing Gage did. They were in the hose room when...this is weird. Gordy said a hole suddenly appeared and some big thing came out of it, something with scales. And when it did, Johnny and Roy got sucked in and then the hole closed and the ugly thing disappeared. And now Johnny and Roy are missing."

Chet felt his clenched muscles relax in a rush. "Oh, man, you have been so set up," he crowed. "This is pure Gage. Revenge on the Phantom." Chet prided himself on his stunts and practical jokes on John Gage and took delight in the fact that Gage usually couldn't manage to top him in the prank department. This time around, Johnny was trying to do it long-distance. "A monster from the sewers? A disappearing monster? Yeah, right. Or did he mean a New York earthquake? I hear they're really big on the East Coast."

Marco intervened hastily. "Chet, it's not a joke. Don't you think I want it to be? Gordo said it wasn't a hole in the floor. It was a hole in midair."

The captain's face grew doubtful. "I have to say, Marco, it does sound like one of Gage's wild schemes to me. He always goes overboard with them."

Lopez shook his head. "No way, Cap. I grew up with Gordy, and I can tell he's really upset. Besides, his captain came on the line and he was worried. They've already put through an official call to the Chief. They can't explain what happened but Roy and Johnny are officially missing."

Chet struggled to squelch the uneasiness in the pit of his stomach. "They conned you." He rubbed his mustache as he considered the possibilities. Nothing obvious occurred to him. This was weird.

The phone rang again. Stanley snatched it. "Station 51." He listened in silence for a long time, then he spoke gravely. "Yes sir. Lopez heard from his cousin already. What actually happened?"

Another pause while Chet tried to fight off his alarm. It must be the chief calling to report an official disappearance. This wasn't fair. It wasn't right. In spite of their ongoing war, Chet liked John Gage, although he would have died before he would have admitted it to anyone. He didn't want to win the battle by default.

"I see," said Stanley in that tight voice he got when something was wrong with one of his men. "Thank you for calling. You'll keep us posted?"

When he hung up, he turned to face the shift. Even Brice looked concerned. Chet stored up the memory of his expression to tell Gage and DeSoto about when they got back. Because they were coming back. Chet was positive they would. They had to. Gage was too blasted annoying to die. Only the good died young.

Over on the couch, Henry, Station 51's mascot lifted his head and bayed unhappily before he collapsed into inactivity again. Could the basset hound sense that there was trouble? They say dogs always knew, didn't they? Chet glanced warily at the animal.

"Well, Marco's cousin was right," Stanley admitted. "They don't understand it at that end, and the men at the station are searching the surrounding area. None of them recognized the creature that evidently removed Johnny and Roy. One of them said it was probably an alligator from the sewer, but that's an urban legend. Nobody really believes giant alligators live in the sewers of New York."

"Johnny would," Stoker piped up involuntarily.

The corners of Stanley's mouth twitched. "Maybe," he said. "But whatever this was, eight firemen saw it. There was no evidence of a quake, so the floor couldn't have opened up and then closed over them. Right now, there is a HazMat team examining the station to make sure chemical fumes or contaminated food or water didn't cause hallucinations. That wouldn't explain where Roy and Johnny went, but there's a possibility that maybe they'd left already and the hallucinogenic affect made the firemen forget that. But there's no answer at Roy and Johnny's hotel room."

"That doesn't mean anything, Cap," Chet put in. "You know Gage. He's in the Big Apple. He'd want to be out doing the town, cruising, looking for women."

"Roy's married," Brice reminded them.

Chet nearly rounded on the hapless paramedic to insist that he stay out of it, that this was Station 51's problem, not his, but he decided it wasn't worth the trouble. "Sir, Joanne. Somebody needs to call her and tell her that her husband is missing."

"I know that," the Cap replied patiently. "When we have more news, I'll let her know. Right now, it's possible that Gage and DeSoto are on their way back to their hotel room. It's seven o'clock. That means it's ten in New York. Perhaps they went out to dinner, or maybe even decided to take in a show. Until they're sure there is nothing at the station to cause a hallucinogenic effect, we wait."

"Figures, doesn't it?" Chet was sure that the worry showed in his voice, even if he didn't want it to. "Even out there, Gage plunges head first into trouble."

"He doesn't usually drag Roy into his crazy schemes," objected Stoker.

"This is why it's important to follow the rules precisely," began Brice, but Kelly whirled on him before he could go any further.

"Shut up, Brice," he barked at the man. When the uptight paramedic blinked at him, Chet whirled away from him and concentrated on controlling his voice and his breathing. "Just...shut up."

John Gage turned slowly and glanced around the bay. His eyes lingered on Ecto-1. He'd never seen anybody do anything like that to a 1959 Cadillac hearse before. And what was all that weird armament on the roof?

"I wish it were a trick, buddy." That was Winston. He looked sympathetic.

"Yeah, this is really 1988." Peter snatched up the newspaper from the desk where Slimer hovered and presented it to Johnny. "Take a look at the date."

There it was, October 10, 1988. Right on the New York Times. Of course there were places where you could have a fake headline printed up--Johnny had had one printed once in his ongoing one-upmanship war against Chet Kelly--but this one looked awfully real.

"Hundreds said to starve each day in War Areas of Southern Sudan?" "Four Nations Agree on Cuban Pullout from Angola War. Toll is Put At 400 in Algerian Riots. Yugoslav Leader Issues a Warning on Nation's Crisis." Johnny didn't remember any wars in Sudan, wherever that was. Riots? Crises? Wars? Some things never changed. "Dodgers Pitcher Suspended for Three Days? A's Sweep Red Sox and advance to World Series." If he could get back where he belonged and remember that, he could bet on it and win major bucks. He checked the Dodgers article. Jay Howell. Fat on his glove in a game against the Mets. Looked like the Dodgers were in the National League playoffs. Score one for the home team. Tom Lasorda. Dodgers' Manager. "Hey, look at this. Tommy Lasorda's the manager of the Dodgers in 1988. They just named him manager a week or so ago--well, in 1976, they did. You mean he's still manager twelve years later?"

It was evidently no surprise to the four men. Johnny skimmed a few minor articles. Something about nuclear tests being discouraged. Again, what was new? An article about candidates and attack ads. Nothing he would have projected in his mind if he'd been dreaming up a headline. Vice President George Bush? So who was president, anyway? And who was Governor Dukakis? That's right, '88 would be a presidential election year.

Johnny set aside the paper and looked around for more proof that he was really in the future. There were things in the office that didn't look right. Was that gizmo on the desk supposed to be a computer? It looked like a monitor screen, but it was different, smaller and more portable, with a keyboard and a tiny control box beside it. He squinted at the name. Commodore 64. He didn't remember anything like that.

"Out of date," Peter said, nodding at the computer thing. "We're getting an upgrade next month. Switching to IBM. Wave of the future, they say. Janine, our secretary, wants to go with an Apple, though."

Johnny was sure he looked blank. Apple Computers? Did they have Banana Computers and Pineapple Computers, too? IBM computers he could understand. "Where's the...uh, mainframe?" he asked, trying to sound technical.

"Everything we need is right here in this baby. We want a computer with a hard drive next time," Ray explained. "See, you have to load the program before you run it, and there isn't that much memory left when you do. Here's the printer."

Gage listened as Ray and Egon explained about the printer in depth. Most of it went over his head. Finally, he interrupted and told them he was going outside to check on Roy.

Peter fell into step with him, but he didn't follow him outside. He stopped and waited in the open doorway.

Johnny stepped outside and a taxi went by. It didn't look any different than the ones he'd seen when they were on their way to the firehouse earlier. In fact, the firehouse looked just the same, except for a neon sign with the same ghostly logo that was painted on the side of the hearse. No more Ladder Company 65 sign. And even if he hadn't paid much attention to the neighborhood, it looked different now. There was a place down the block that must sell oriental food. A blinking light in the window said, 'Dim Sum,' over and over again.

Another car whizzed past. Johnny gaped at it. He'd never seen a car like that before.

"1987 Ford Taurus," Peter said softly from the doorway as if he'd guessed Johnny's reaction.

"Okay. Okay. So it's real. That doesn't mean it's forever." He made a brushing off gesture at Peter. "I'm going after Roy."

He spotted his friend further down this side of the street. There was a little enclosed courtyard next to the firehouse--that had been there before--and then another building, shut down for the night. Roy was leaning against the wall, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, his face vacant, distant. When Johnny came up and clapped him on the shoulder, he jumped a foot.

"Easy, easy, buddy, it's gonna be okay." Okay, so he said that to dying patients when they were out on a run. Soothed them so they'd be quiet and calm, even when he was sure they were gonna die. But he couldn't lie like that to his best friend, the guy who had somehow become more than his partner. Roy was family. Roy's kids even called him 'Uncle Johnny'. Right now in this time, Roy's kids were grown up, and DeSoto hadn't got to watch. Joanne was older than he was now.

Maybe Johnny was lucky, not having any close kin. He had his aunt, but when was the last time he'd seen her? He had casual friends; he had the guys in his shift, and he had girlfriends that came and went so fast that Chet had teased him he needed a scorecard to keep track of them. But if he had to be stranded in the future, at least he had his best friend with him. They weren't without skills. They were trained paramedics and refresher courses could bring them up to date pretty quick if they had to stay here. They'd be able to get jobs. There were a lot of things they'd have to learn, modern history, technology. He could do it if he had to.

But it was different for Roy. The man adored his family. Johnny might be an unofficial part of it, but he knew his presence with Roy wouldn't begin to make up what he'd lost.

"How is it going to be okay?" Roy demanded bitterly. "We're stuck in the future. Look at these cars. There aren't any like that in 1976. Everything's different. The way science is blossoming, we're probably dinosaurs. And Joanne and the kids...." He sucked in a huge breath. "My God, Johnny, my kids are grown up. If I show up, they might not even remember me. I didn't get to see them go on their first dates or get their driver's licenses. I missed their birthdays. And Joanne..." He hugged himself tighter. "We can't get home. Did you see that place we came out of? We're here because of a lab accident. You think they know how to travel in time? They're fruitcakes, Ray. They think they can catch ghosts."

"They...did have Slimer."

Roy shuddered and made an abrupt, pushing-away gesture with his hands. "We're trapped here," he groaned. "We don't have current ID's. For all we know, even the money's different."

"Come on, Roy." Johnny was as scared as his partner was, and he wanted to go home, too, back to where he belonged. He wasn't ready for this. Give him a dozen years and it would be natural to him, too. "We'll make it," he said. "We're partners. We'll hang together. We'll work something out. We'll make those four guys figure out what happened. We're going home. I know we will. It's gonna be just fine."

"Don't, Johnny."

"Don't what?"

"Don't paramedic me. Don't feed me a snow job just to calm me down. I expect more than that from you."

"What? What do you expect? For me to click my heels together and say 'there's no place like home' and magick us back to Kansas? It doesn't work that way. I know how you feel, Roy." He held up a hand. "Okay, so I don't really know. I've never loved any woman like you love Joanne and I don't have any kids. But I know how I'd feel if I were stuck in another time and you were on the other side of it. We have to face it together, Roy. We have to."

Roy gazed at him for a long moment, then he did something that astonished Johnny. He turned to face his partner and put his arms around him in a fierce hug. Roy was more a clap-on-the-shoulder kind of guy, but he must have needed the reassurance. Johnny hugged him back. Roy was trembling. He was lost, and this was the only way Johnny had to reassure him.

When they drew apart, they didn't speak of the moment. Instead, Johnny put a hand on Roy's arm. "Come on, let's go back. We need to find out what happened, how this works. I bet you they have a lot of ideas already. They're sure to. We'll get home, Roy, if I have to stand over them and crack the whip. We'll get home."

Maybe. The thought hung unspoken between them.

Winston Zeddemore had a bad feeling about this whole deal. He felt for the two guys from the past, brought here against their will in an accident that probably couldn't be recreated without the time-hopping entity. They might be stuck here, away from their families and everything they knew. That sucked.

Worse was the thought that the entity itself might have stayed in 1976. If it could feel any affinity for the Ghostbusters, it might track them down and zap them in the past. He knew the others had thought of that, too. He comforted himself with the thought that the demon probably wouldn't know New York history or even human lifespans. It might expect them to be armed with proton packs and throwers back then, too. Another thought occurred to him--maybe it had already hopped out of 1976 back here where it thought it belonged.

If that were the case, the one thing they'd better do was to give the two misplaced firemen a crash course in the use of the throwers. It might take all six of them to recapture the thing.

"Egon," he said to the man who stood gazing at the fried innards of his dimension shifting device.

"Winston?" Egon didn't even turn. He scribbled a quick note in a notebook that was rapidly becoming full. "I must begin repairs on the dimensionometer immediately. We may need to use it to go into the past to retrieve the entity before it does unspeakable harm there."

"Yeah, and messes with the timeline," agreed an earnest Ray, who had already started to remove burned-out wiring. "Just think, it could fry us when we were kids."

"I do not believe it could do that," Egon said stubbornly.

"Do what?" Peter stood in the doorway with the two firemen behind him.

"Track us down in the past," said Winston, "and kill us then."

Peter shook his head so vehemently that the lock of hair he'd trained to hang down over his forehead bounced. "No way, Jose," he objected, although Winston saw a quickly masked flash of doubt in the green eyes that suggested he'd considered the possibility. "If he did that, we'd never have built the device and he wouldn't be in 1976 to begin with."

"It's the time-travel paradox," Egon insisted. "If I go back in time and accidentally kill my own grandfather, I would never have existed so how could I go back in time to kill him?"

"My brain hurts," Peter groaned. "Besides, we can't go back after it anyway, so we have to hope like mad that it isn't tracking down our younger selves."

"Wait a minute," said Johnny Gage. He pushed his way into the room and stopped in the center, looking lost and frustrated but determined to have his say. "They know all this kind of thing in this time? They proved it? I thought you said you didn't have time travel here? What is this, a big snow job? Roy, they're conning us."

Roy caught up with him. "I don't think they are. They're just brainstorming." He eyed the twisted, sizzled components of the device.

"I think it's time you explain how we got here--time travel and all this." DeSoto waved a hand at the machine.

"Well, gentlemen, we really don't know that much about time travel...even in 1988."

"What about that friend of yours, Egon, the temporal physicist who's developing that time travel theory?" Ray prompted excitedly.

"Doctor Beckett? 'Theory' is exactly right, Ray. He's years form having a working time machine, if ever. It's entirely on the drawing board."

"I thought that guy was a crackpot," threw in Peter. "What was it you were talking about last time he was here? The string theory? Yeah, sounded brilliant, all right."

Egon frowned. "That man has a number of doctorates, Peter. More than your two."

"Yeah, so many degrees he could start a heat wave," Peter muttered.

Egon's eyes danced, but he continued seriously, "He is even a candidate for the Nobel Prize. He might have some unlikely theories, but he is a genius. If anyone can develop time travel, he can. Unfortunately, he has not developed it yet. Still, I might contact him if we find ourselves stuck." He looked back at the two paramedics. "We were trying to send ghosts into another dimension. We told you we're Ghostbusters. We trap ghosts and store them. It's a long story, but suffice it to say, we keep the world safe." He allowed a smile at the look the two men from the past shared--one of disbelief.

"And the containment unit is getting crowded." Ray picked up the story. "So we thought we could use this machine to send ghosts into other dimensions. It worked when we tried it on a ghost, but then we tried it on a demon."

"Yeah." Zeddemore shook his head. "There was an explosion and poof! You guys got transferred in from the past. The demon we were trying to send off on a permanent vacation could time shift. We just didn't know how much."

"So...how do we get home?" Roy's voice was shaky and Johnny put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing slightly.

"Can't we try to recreate the accident and see if it will give us any ideas?" Ray's eyes shone with excitement as he asked the question of Egon.

Peter wasn't sure they could, not if the time travel part had been caused by the demon's time-shifting powers. Without the demon, they couldn't duplicate the necessary conditions. Peter had a sneaky feeling the two paramedics had become permanent residents of 1988, whether they liked it or not. Tough on Roy's family. Tough on all of them. Johnny hadn't mentioned a wife, but that didn't mean he didn't have people who would miss him. Peter shivered. What if he'd been thrust into the past? The guys would still be around, but he hadn't known them in 1976. Ray was still in high school then. God, that would suck.

"We can do that," Egon replied. "However, I'm not certain it would prove efficacious. If it requires the demon to participate...." He paralleled Peter's thinking.

"Yeah, but we got readings of the whole thing on your meter and you had it set on record," Ray reminded him. "Maybe we can duplicate the energy involved without the demon."

"Maybe," said Egon thoughtfully. "But first, there's a great deal of repair work to do. The dimensionometer was badly damaged by the temporal effect."

"We do a lot of maintenance on our equipment. Maybe we could help with that."

Egon and Ray looked doubtful. They already planned to keep Peter away from the dimensionometer on general principles. Peter had a knack for connecting things wrong, designing gizmos that blew up, and in general proving that he was not a high tech kind of guy. Now the two firemen wanted to play, too.

"Possibly," Egon said with more wariness than tact. "What do you know about temporal physics?"

The two paramedics looked decidedly unhappy."

"We'll have to strip out the burned-out components and some of them can't be replaced until tomorrow when the electronics stores open. We don't have all the parts on hand. I'm making a list of them."

"I am, too," agreed Ray. "We'll cross-reference them in the morning. If we use a slightly bigger amplifier this time, and a better surge protector, and plug in the power components separately we can control the energy levels better." He went off into a technical explanation that left Peter bored and Johnny scratching his head. Roy wasn't even listening.

Peter eyed the two paramedics from the past, then he snapped his fingers. "Hey, you guys have anything to eat before you came here?"

"Eat?" Roy looked surprised.

"Anything to eat?" Johnny plunged in and picked up the slack for his partner, prompted by sympathy and understanding, and it made Winston think kindly of the guy. Firemen could relate to the fellow feeling the Ghostbusters had for each other, the sense of teamwork forged in the crucible of danger because they, too, experienced it. These men were more than just co-workers.

"Come on, Roy, we need something to eat. We haven't had anything since lunch. They were gonna give us dinner but we didn't have a chance to eat. You guys decent cooks? What'cha got?"

"Well, I can send out for pizza," Peter offered. "Whatever you do, try not to eat anything Ray says is an old family recipe while you're here. And avoid anything Egon cooks. He has his own little specialties like sweat sandwiches."

That startled Roy out of his preoccupation and his eyes widened.

"Oh, come on," Johnny burst out. "You're kidding us. Nobody in his right mind would make sweat sandwiches."

"They were not sandwiches made of sweat," Egon pointed out without looking up from his notebook. "They were sandwiches designed to replace what the body loses through perspiration."

"Oh, well, same difference," chorused Peter and Johnny in perfect unison, and then stared at each other in astonishment. Ray's head came up and he grinned in pure delight.

"Not two of them," groaned Winston. "Pete's bad enough."

"What do you mean, 'Pete's bad enough'?" objected the subject of his complaint. He drew himself to his full 5'11" and tried to look down his nose at Winston, not an easy task since Winston was the taller by nearly three inches. "I'll have you know, I saved the world single-handedly when Nexa was here."

"And remind us of it at least three times a week," kidded Ray.

Peter gave him a poke in the ribcage. The byplay appeared to relax the two visiting firemen. "Ignore them," Venkman insisted. "I always do. Let's send out for pizza for you guys. Tell me what you like on it? Pineapple's good."

"Not only fruit computers, fruit pizza?" Johnny shook his head. "The future is strange, Roy."

"Don't remind me." Roy didn't react to the teasing, and Winston saw Johnny realize that and stow it away. Gage gave his buddy another pat on the shoulder as he followed Peter out to call in the pizza order.

Roy took two steps after him and then stopped. Poor guy had a lot to weigh him down. Winston took pity on him. "Come on, I'll give you the ten-cent tour. Show you what's the same in this place and what's different. We've still got the firepoles. That'll be familiar to you, anyway."

"Station 51's on one level. We don't have firepoles."

As a conversational gambit, his response worked like a candle snuffer, but Winston didn't let that stop him. "Egon, I'm gonna show him around. We'll set up a couple of foldaway beds for the guys. They can bunk in the lab or on the second floor while they're here. I'll see if I can find them some clean clothes. Roy can probably wear my stuff, even if the jeans'll be a little long. Johnny will have to go with Pete's, or maybe even yours, Egon, since he's a skinny guy. We'll work something out." He beckoned to the paramedic. "Come on, Roy, right this way. We do tours of the place at least once a week. Usually it's school kids. You probably do that at your firehouse, too. Sometimes it's women, and Peter loves those tours. He thinks he's a ladies man, but he goes through women so fast you wouldn't believe it."

"Like Johnny." Roy was still on autopilot, but he smiled at the thought.

"You telling me we're stuck with two Peters for the duration?" Winston groaned. "Man, I knew that gizmo was trouble." He draped a companionable arm around the paramedic's shoulder and led him out past Janine's desk where Johnny and Peter were engaged in trying to one-up each other on every woman they had ever dated while Slimer hung near Peter's shoulder dripping ectoplasm down his back. Peter hadn't noticed that yet, but when he did, there was sure to be a major explosion.

"Let's start at the top," he said to Roy and led the way up to the third floor lab.

Egon frowned. Beside him, Ray gave a grunt of effort and fell back, clutching a length of cable. Peter could see all the coating had melted off down to the bare wires, and they were blackened and broken here and there. It wasn't a pretty sight.

Undaunted, Ray jumped up and laid it with the others. "Section 26a through 30a, check." Egon made a squiggle on his workpad.

"Pizza's here," Peter announced. "Winston's trying to hold Slimer off it. The spud finished his own pizza in one gulp and he's got a lean and hungry look about ours."

"Gosh, yeah, I'm sure hungry," agreed Ray. "Come on, Egon."

"Perhaps another ten minutes," came the absent-minded answer.

Peter snatched the notebook from his hand. "Dinner, Egon. Now."

"This is important work, Peter. Those two men are depending on me."

"Yeah, and they're depending on you not to screw it up because you've been working all day without stopping to eat or rest. You're not perfect, Egon. The longer you work tonight, the more imperfect you're gonna get--and an imperfect Spengler's not a pretty sight."

That won a quickly suppressed grin from the blond physicist. "If you insist." He grabbed the book back to scribble two more notes. "However, we shall resume the first thing in the morning."

"Wouldn't have it any other way," agreed Peter. "You'll be down here and you don't want me to touch it, and that means I get to sleep in."

"Actually, Peter, we had thought to send you out for the electronics components as soon as the store opens."

"It opens at eight." Ray's face was carefully deadpan. "And it's way up on West 58th Street."

Peter stuck out his tongue at him and threw him an I'll-deal-with-you-later look. Then he turned his back on his two buddies and led the way out of the lab.

Johnny was enjoying the pizza, so caught up in some long, involved story he was telling Winston and Slimer that he paused in the very act of chewing to speak. Not exactly esthetically pleasing, although Slimer didn't seem to mind. Probably just whetted the spud's appetite. Roy, on the other hand, was chewing away as if it were means of exercising his jaw. As long as Gage still had hope that the Ghostbusters could reverse the process, he would probably find this an adventure. Roy didn't look like he dared to hope.

Peter plopped down in a chair and grabbed a piece of pizza. Ray and Egon sat down, too, and Egon checked his piece carefully to make sure it was free of anchovies, pineapples or black olives. Peter grinned. He'd been a good boy and ordered generic pizza without anyone's personal dislikes. "I dragged them away from the wreck. I swear, these two guys would rather work than eat."

Johnny slid his chair sideways to allow more room for Ray. "We usually sit down to eat and get a call. Cap will have just dished up his clam chowder--and it's great, believe me--or Marco will have made chile, and the tones'll sound and we'll have a rescue or a fire. No time for even one bite."

"You took that burger with you on the call last week," Roy reminded him, a faint twinkle in his eyes.

"Well, yeah. We hadn't had time to grab a bite all day, and you were driving. I figured I'd get in a few bites before we got to the site of the accident. It's not my fault what happened."

"What did happen?" Peter decided to play the straight man. If it would lift the burden of Roy's gloom, it would be worth it.

The dark-haired paramedic swallowed the last bite of his pizza and snatched up the next piece, fingers curled around it protectively to shield it from Slimer. "Well, some guy didn't hear our siren and pulled out of a cross street. He was wearing earphones, dictating some report for his job. He pulled out right in front of us, and Roy had to swerve, but we couldn't miss him entirely, and we clipped his bumper, spun him around into the curb and the car turned over on its side."

"And the next thing we know, Johnny's wearing his hamburger," said Roy with a straight face. "He's got a slice of tomato on his nose and lettuce inside his collar and a big streak of ketchup down the front of his shirt."

"Wearing my food's not my idea of fun," Johnny groused reminiscently. The wistful tone got covered up fast the minute he caught himself at it.

"Yeah, and when we got out of the squad to get the victim out of there and treat him, it looked like Johnny was bleeding."

"You thought I was bleeding, too," Johnny put in. "I kept saying, 'I'm not hurt, I'm not hurt' and trying to get to the victim, and Roy was grabbing at me, trying to make sure I didn't have a cut artery."

"Then I realized it was just his lunch," Roy finished with disgust.

"He took off to the wrecked car so fast I nearly couldn't keep up with him. I had to haul out the biophone and drug box, but the guy wasn't hurt, just trapped in the car."

"We had to pry the door open to get him out."

"Delayed us getting to the original call, and Squad 10 had to take over that one." Johnny took another bite and chewed thoughtfully. "Roy, do you realize they're stuck with Brice at the station till we get back? That proves it. We have to find a way home. That would be cruel and unusual punishment, believe me."

"Who's Brice?" Winston picked up his glass of milk and chugged it, leaving himself with a milky mustache. Ray waved his pizza in that direction and Winston wiped it off.

"Craig Brice is the paramedic from hell," Johnny blurted out. "Even Roy can't work with him, and Roy can work with anybody. Guy must have swallowed the rule book. He can't even raise his eyebrow without consulting regs. Probably has his own step chart to use the urinal." He heaved a big sigh, bit off another piece of pizza, and broke off the trailing strings of mozzarella with his finger. "Pretty bad, when I wouldn't even mind seeing Brice again." He waggled a cheesy finger at Roy. "And if you ever tell him--or Chet--that I said that...."

Roy jumped at the unexpected finger in his face. He'd drifted away again. Johnny gave his partner a supportive look. "Egon, I meant to ask. No aftereffects from your fall?" Roy put down his pizza, pushing the napkin away.

Peter cast a measuring glance at Egon. After all, Spengs had been almost unconscious not that long ago. Egon was eating with what looked like every evidence of a normal appetite. He didn't seem sick or in pain.

Johnny leaned over and said for Peter's ears alone, "I've been watching him. There's no evidence of any delayed reaction. I think he's fine."

Once a paramedic, always a paramedic. Peter grinned. "Thanks, guy. Egon tends to ignore things like that--and he'd been working hard downstairs."

"I have monitored myself, Peter," Egon said without hesitation. "What we are doing is important, but I would not ignore symptoms of a serious head injury, I assure you."

"You'd better not. Anyway, I seem to remember you ignoring that cut you got last week when you were working on the possible trap modifications. Blood everywhere." He rolled his eyes at the two paramedics.

Egon displayed a finger with a tiny, fading line across its tip. "Oh yes, Peter, anyone can see what a terrible wound this was. My life was in immediate danger. You should have given me CPR."

"Are you kidding, big guy? If you'd needed CPR, I'd have called Janine up to give you mouth-to-mouth. She lives for moments like that."

Egon blushed.

"You guys are trained in CPR?" asked Roy in surprise.

Winston nodded. "We keep current on it. There are too many ways to have accidents with the throwers that can stop a guy's heart. We can't take the chance of waiting for the paramedics to get here."

"Yeah, you'll never know when you'll get zapped with a thrower," Peter threw in.

"Once, Peter," Ray reminded him with exaggerated patience. "It was only once. And I apologized about sixty times. You didn't even stop breathing."

Ray had been devastated at the time, and Peter wouldn't have hassled him about the accident with a low-level proton stream if the hassling hadn't proved to keep the time-shifted paramedics interested. "I had to go to the hospital overnight," he recalled lugubriously. "Egon insisted. I had to eat hospital food and a nurse that looked like Attila the Hun gave me a bath. The last thing I want is the Mongol Horde getting up close and personal...."

He trailed off when the others, even the two newcomers, cracked up with laughter.

Slimer took advantage of their hysteria to swoop in and finish the pizza.

As he chased the spud around the second floor yelling for the guys to get a trap to catch him in, Peter reflected that he'd done pretty well keeping the two men from dwelling on their problems. Once a psychologist, always a psychologist.

Johnny Gage opened his eyes and peered up at an unfamiliar ceiling high overhead. It didn't look like the ceiling of his apartment, and it didn't resemble the familiar ceiling at Station 51. Had he been gifted with incredible luck the night before? Was it a girlfriend's place....

At the sound of familiar deep breathing a few feet away, he shot down that idea. Roy's breathing. He knew it too well from the station. So if he wasn't there and Roy wasn't sleeping over--that meant last night hadn't been a bad dream after all. It was real. They were trapped in the future.

He sat up cautiously and ran a hand over his jaw. Stranded here without even a razor or clean underwear, although Winston had made a quick run last night to pick up a few essentials to tide them over. Jockeys, socks, a couple of razors, soap. He'd wind up wearing Peter's clothes today, although he was thinner than Peter was. Peter had offered his sweats. "Won't matter if you don't have the great Venkman physique," he'd said.

"Oh yeah, well, women like my body," had been his response.

"Women like Attila the Nurse?" Roy had added. "Women with three kids and a desperate need to find them a dad? Women groupies?"

"Pick on me when I'm down. That's not a partner's job."

"You bet it is," Peter had pitched in. "These three have that particular job down to an art."

Egon had smiled. "But you make it so easy, Peter."

Johnny had recognized their byplay. It felt normal, the way it did back at Station 51 with his buddies on the A Shift. He sighed and rolled out of bed.

He decided he'd let Roy sleep in as long as he could. Every minute he was asleep was a minute when he wasn't worrying about Joanne and his kids. Johnny knew he was luckier in his exile than Roy was. He had Roy right here. It would have been better for Roy if he'd come alone and left Roy with his family. Was it harder to lose a partner or to lose a wife and kids?

Pushing those brooding thoughts out of his mind, he went to investigate the bathroom up on the third floor, taking with him the supplies he'd got last night. He'd go with his own jeans and Peter's sweatshirt today.

Slimer was nowhere in sight, which suited the paramedic just fine. There were sounds in the kitchen, but he didn't investigate before he climbed the spiral staircase. At the top, he heard snoring of monumental proportions in the bunkroom. A quick peek revealed Peter sprawled loosely across a four-poster double bed. The other three beds were singles of the institutional variety, and they were neatly made.

Across from the bunkroom there was another lab, this one full of weird doohickeys that Johnny had never encountered before and hoped he wouldn't again. There was even another computer. Two computers in one place? Ghostbusting must pay really well. Or maybe computers cost less in the future. Private computers--every home will have one. It boggled the mind. Used to terminals and data entry operators, Johnny had trouble imagining the guy on the street using a computer. He'd probably crash one first time he tried.

The bathroom was free, so he had his shower and shave and ventured down again, fully dressed. Roy was still sleeping, so Johnny tiptoed past and went to investigate the kitchen.

Winston was just finishing up the dishes when Johnny came in. "Morning. I'm stuck with K.P. duty this week," he said. "Whip you up some breakfast?"

"I can make it if you show me where things are. Then you can go down and help with the repairs." He nodded ceilingward. "I thought Peter was going to go out and pick up supplies today."

"We let him think that to bug him but Ray went instead," Winston said as he handed Johnny his eggs and bacon. "He knew just what he wanted and he knows a lot of wholesale places where he can get a great discount. Sending Peter after them would be like sending a husband grocery shopping. My mama says if she sends my dad, he comes home with things she never ordered, like bags of cashews and exotic foods that are impossible to cook and he forgets bread and milk. Pete in an electronics store is a crisis looking to happen."

"So what does he do around here, anyway?" asked Johnny as he took a bowl from the dish drainer began to crack eggs for scrambling. "I mean, if he isn't up on this technical stuff?" Winston started the bacon.

"Well, Ghostbusting was Peter's idea in the first place," Winston explained. "I wasn't here at the start; they hired me after a few weeks when they realized they needed more than three men to do the job. They were all college professors, if you can buy that."

"Even Peter?"

"Well, Pete's a psychologist. You can get into parapsychology from there. Pete might not be great at designing equipment, but he's the greatest team player you ever saw. Sort of like Larry Bird. Okay, before your time, but he's gonna be the center for the Celtics."

"Thought that was Dave Cowens."

"Retired."

Johnny perked up. "Hey, maybe I should be taking notes. When I get home, if I know who's gonna win the World Series in '76, and the Superbowl, I could really clean up."

"Egon told us not to tell you things like that for fear of you going back and changing things. Sorry, m'man." He pulled out a frying pan for Gage and the other man poured in the eggs. "Anyway, I was in Nam right at the end, so I taught the three college idiots strategy. Turns out, Peter's a natural at it. So in a way, he's our leader on a bust. Egon's the genius. He can theorize anything. Ray can build whatever Egon dreams up. They figured out how to take detectable readings of ghosts and designed equipment to do it, and it works. And then they figured out how to trap and store them."

Johnny paused abruptly with his spatula raised. "Where do they store them? Here?"

"In the basement. There's a big containment unit like we said last night. It's kind of full right now, so we were testing that gizmo that sucked you in. It's supposed to send ghosts and demons in other dimensions so far away they can't get back."

"Spirits and demons! You sound like my great-grandfather. He was a shaman and he always talked about spirits. I can remember him from when I really little, back on the reservation. He believed in them, but the rest of the family had grown away from the old ways."

"Well, a lot of other people don't believe it, either," said Winston easily. "Even here, there are a lot of folks who think what we do is hype and con man stuff. Get away from the Tri-State area and you've got people who believe we're just a weird New York thing and that it's all phony. But it's not phony, and you know that. You saw it happen, and you saw Slimer."

"Yeah, more than I like, I can tell you. Winston, can Egon and Ray fix that machine and send us home with it? If they can't, it's gonna break Roy's heart."

"If anybody can, they can." Winston removed the spatula from Johnny's hand and scooped the eggs out onto a plate. He flipped the bacon in the other skillet once, and served it, too. "Look, guy, I know how tough this has to be. We lost Egon in the Netherworld once. When we tracked him down, a demon had him stuck in a cell and I never saw a guy so miserable. He thought he'd never get home, but we got him back. If we can do that, we should be able to figure out how send you guys back. Egon took readings of the whole thing and recorded it. We've even got a video tape of it that Ray's going to go over this morning. Uh, you know about video tapes?"

Johnny frowned. "Video tapes? Yeah, I think I've seen them, but they cost a lot."

"Not these days. Wave of the future. If you go to invest in VCR's, don't go for Beta."

Johnny nodded.

Winston caught himself and continued, "Even if we don't have the demon, we may be able to simulate what it did to screw up the process." He steered Gage out toward the dining room table. "Orange juice? Coffee?"

"Both," Johnny replied. "But, it sounds like the bottom line is this happened because this demon could move through time, am I right? And it's not here anymore. So it's not something your gizmo can do, ordinarily." Tell me I'm wrong here. Because that means we'll never get home.

"Not ordinarily, no. But think of it like this. You and I might not be scientists, but Egon is one of the smartest men on the entire planet and Ray isn't far behind. And now, there's a link with 1976. Trace energy. They may be able to make the portal link to that. So, don't give up hope, and don't let your friend give up, either."

Johnny drew a deep breath and poked unenthusiastically at his eggs. It would have been so much easier if this had simply been one of Chet Kelly's pranks.

"And there's still no word?"

Joanne DeSoto's eyes held shadows, but she clung to the composure that firemen's wives learn early. She had come by the station as soon as she'd dropped the kids off at school, in hopes of news of her missing husband. Captain Stanley had called her just after eight.

Chet wished they had something better to tell her. He couldn't even say, 'no news is good news.' What good would that do? It would just be another big, fat lie.

They had new information, of course. Cap had been on the phone to the captain at Ladder 65 where Gage and DeSoto had disappeared and he had reported that the HazMat team had found nothing that could have induced hallucinogenic reactions. No apparent evidence of foul play, either, even assuming the whole squad there had murdered Gage and DeSoto and then covered up their deaths with a weird story. Not likely, since Marco swore that his cousin was a straight-up guy and insisted that he could tell if Gordy were lying to him, and that he wasn't. Something too weird to fit the rules had happened, and it figured that John Gage was involved.

"I'm sorry, Joanne. There's no word at all. Would you like my wife to come and stay with you while you wait?" the cap asked.

"No, you don't need to, Hank. I don't want to upset the kids, and if Emily comes over, they'll know something's wrong. Roy doesn't always call home when he's out of town--it's expensive. There's time enough to tell them later, when we have more information. The press doesn't know anything about it yet, do they?"

"No, they're keeping a tight lid on it at the New York end," Stanley reassured her. "That's not to say some enterprising reporter won't pick up on it, but we'll hope not. I don't want it all over the headlines. Mysterious disappearances aren't exactly a dime a dozen, and the UFO crowd will be sure to put their claims in."

"UFO?" Joanne flinched. "Hank, you don't think it actually could be a UFO? That the creature they said they saw was an...an alien?"

"No, I don't believe that for one second, and you shouldn't either. Whatever this is, there's a nice, sane, sensible explanation for it. We just haven't thought of it yet."

Chet frowned. Could someone have staged it to look like there had been an alien landing? Beam me up, Scotty, like they did in Star Trek? But why pick on the L.A. County paramedics, unless they'd been in the wrong place at the wrong time? If only it really was one of Johnny's stunts, a more grandiose one than Gage had ever managed before. The only reason Chet didn't embrace that comforting theory was because he knew Roy would never worry his wife. He might go along with a similar gag here at the station, where it would be resolved in a few minutes. He wouldn't worry her long distance, not for ten million dollars. Gage wouldn't worry her either. Had to give the guy that. He was pretty decent to Roy's wife.

Maybe it really was a UFO. Chet opened his mouth to say so, then he took a look at Joanne and held his tongue. He'd sound out Mike and Marco later, see what they thought. Maybe he should go to New York and check it out. He had two days off that started as soon as this shift was over. If it were really a UFO, there'd be way to tell, wouldn't there? Somebody from Station 51 ought to be on hand.

Joanne hesitated, then she ventured a cautious smile. Even Chet, who wasn't the most sensitive guy in the world, could tell how brave and unconvincing it was. "We'll get 'em back," he proclaimed. "Wherever they are, he's got Johnny to take care of him, doesn't he?"

That was the right thing to say, even if it made all the other guys stare. Her chin came up. "Oh, I know that," she said. "Johnny wouldn't let anything happen to Roy."

False courage, but sometimes that was the only kind going. You learned that pretty fast when you had to race into a burning building to rescue a civilian. As long as you didn't stop and think about your own danger, you could keep doing it. If Joanne kept thinking the two missing paramedics would look after each other, she could live with it awhile longer. But, in a way, Chet had meant it. Johnny would take care of Roy, and vice versa.

She departed with a smile for all of them, and a squeeze of each man's hand, even Brice's. For once, Mr. Perfect Paramedic didn't spout statistics or say the wrong things. Maybe the hard elbow Stoker gave him in the ribcage had something to do with it.

"I'll have to tell Johnny you said that," Marco teased him as soon as Mrs. DeSoto was gone.

Chet did the only thing he could, plead complete innocence. "Said what?"

Peter staggered down the spiral stairs with his eyes half open and wandered into the dining room where John Gage was just finishing up his breakfast. "Cfpxff," he muttered. The paramedic jumped.

Winston came out of the kitchen and passed Peter a cup of coffee. The psychologist buried his nose in it, then took a slow sip.

"Ignore him," Winston urged Johnny. "He's always like this in the mornings."

"Am not." Peter flopped into a chair. "Breakfast?" he asked hopefully.

As he'd expected, Winston gestured in the direction of the kitchen. "Make whatever you want, Pete. I'm heading down to help on the great rebuilding. Ray got all the parts already--knew it wasn't safe to let you loose in an electronics store. Egon has all the damaged components out. We should have it back together again by sometime this afternoon." He clattered down the stairs, pausing on the landing. "Pete, fix Roy some breakfast when he comes down."

Peter couldn't argue with that, although he gave a put-upon, "Aw," just to keep in practice.

Johnny looked startled. "You mean you guys can send us home this afternoon? That's great. That's really great. I'll go wake Roy and tell him."

Peter snagged Gage's wrist before he could rise. "Whoa, hold it, bunky. Fixed doesn't mean we solved how to reverse the time thing yet. Just means that, when we do, we'll have the portal ready."

"I should probably wake him up, though."

"He's up. He's in the shower. He came up when I was getting dressed. Let him be for a few minutes. It's tough on the guy."

"Roy can handle anything," Johnny defended his partner. "It's just that he's really crazy about his wife and kids. It's different for me." He subsided into his chair. "I mean, I want to go home. Of course I do. All my friends are there--well, except for Roy, and he's my partner, y'know. My best friend. But I still want to get back. Only...."

"Only?"

Johnny hesitated. "Well, we know this is real now. So out there," and he waved a hand at the window, "is a world I'm not gonna get to see again for twelve years; that's if I get home. I want to go out and look around. Maybe buy something from 1988 to prove I've been here. Because, when I get home, the other guys aren't gonna believe this for a second. I want to find something to one-up Chet."

"Chet?" Peter prodded. He sipped his coffee and waited, prepared to let the guy unwind. Peter loved to be the center of attention, but there were times when it was better to sink into the woodwork. Gage might not know Peter very well yet, but he still had to talk. He seemed constitutionally unable to keep silent anyway, and Peter wasn't sure yet how much of that was their situation and how much was the essential Gage.

"Chet Kelly, guy on my shift at Station 51. Chet's a prankster, and I'm his main target. He's always dreaming up new gags to pull on me and finding new ways to kid me. Sometimes they backfire." He grinned reminiscently. "So, when I go back, I want to pull something on Chet that even he can't deny. Something I couldn't have had made up quick at a novelty shop, so I can rub his nose in it."

"Sounds like a plan to me. I'll see if Egon will go for the tourist routine."

"Why wouldn't he?" Johnny asked in surprise.

"Egon's worried about you and Roy learning things that could mess up your future. Ever watch Star Trek? Remember the episode where the Enterprise got thrown back to the 1960s and they ran into this jet pilot? They were afraid what he'd learned would change history, so they found a way to send him back before they met him, so that, for him, it didn't happen."

"You're kidding. Come on, I know you're kidding." Gage looked dismayed. "I remember that episode. They're showing reruns now, and I saw it a couple of weeks ago. If you did that, what would happen? I mean, I know they've notified Roy's wife. You'd be changing the past, then. Isn't that just as bad?"

"No, because it wasn't meant to happen like this in the first place," said Peter. "At least I don't think it was. Maybe you're here because you were meant to be all along. Ray likes time travel stories. He's got a comic book he reads where the hero travels the timelines, and there are all these rules. Ray tried to explain it to me once, but I'm not into comics."

"But it's just a guess, isn't it?" Johnny said. "I mean, the comic was written by somebody who writes sci fi, not a...a what do you call it, a temporal physicist." He looked remarkably pleased with himself for producing the term.

"Well, yeah, most of the physicists I know don't write comic books in their off time." Peter was charmed by the thought of Egon pushing aside his experiments at the end of the day and doodling out a 'toon or two. Maybe he ought to suggest it to Spengs as a stress buster.

Johnny ignored his comment. "You mean, if we went back before we came, we wouldn't remember any of this?"

Peter shrugged. "Dunno. I'm a psychologist, not a time traveler. Egon's the one who could answer that, and he doesn't know much about time travel, even if we went back to 1837 once."

Johnny pinned him in a suspicious brown gaze. "You went back to 1837? Oh, come on, Pete. I bet you're just as bad as Chet. You're pulling my leg, aren't you? Aren't you?"

"We met Ebenezer Scrooge."

Johnny relaxed. "He's a fictional character. I know he's a fictional character. Dickens wrote it. Last year, at Christmas, they had a couple of the movies on, and Joanne read the book out loud to the kids after Christmas dinner."

"And maybe he was a guy Dickens knew, and the story was real, did you ever think of that?"

Johnny tried hard not to look doubtful. "I think you're a lot like Chet."

"But better looking," said Peter positively.

Johnny pulled out his wallet and removed a snapshot of a cluster of men standing in front of a fire engine. There was Johnny, probably a year younger and a lot more carefree, and Roy with no shadows in his eyes. "See, here's the Cap, Captain Stanley, he's a good guy. And here's Mike Stoker, he drives the engine. And this is Marco Lopez. And here's Chet." His finger touched the short, mustached character in a gesture that was more revealing than he must have realized. His practical joke rival was really a friend even if the two of them didn't admit it, but the fond touch was for more than Chet Kelly, it was for home, for everything he'd lost. He shoved the picture back in his wallet so quickly he nearly bent it.

"Told you I was better looking."

Somehow, that was the right thing to say. Johnny's face relaxed and he grinned in anticipation. "I'll tell Chet you said so." Then he turned around. Peter hadn't heard Roy on the stairs, but Johnny probably had that partner sixth sense where DeSoto was concerned. Peter could sense his own buddies like that.

Roy had pasted on a look of determined brightness that looked as phony as a three dollar bill. Johnny's hand tightened for a second on his coffee cup, then he consciously relaxed it. "Hey, Roy," he greeted. "Peter's gonna take us sightseeing."

"Morning, guy," Peter greeted him. "Finally, somebody sleeps later than I do. I love it. I'm gonna have to rub it in to Egon when we get downstairs. You want coffee? Breakfast?"

"Coffee," Roy admitted.

"How about some bacon and eggs? I haven't eaten either. No problem to fix it."

"Thanks." Roy dropped into Egon's chair. He didn't look as if sleep had made him feel any better. He'd probably lain awake thinking about his wife and kids. The best thing Peter could do for him was offer him distractions. Of course, if the guys couldn't get the dimension hopper to pop the two back to 1976, he'd need a lot more than that, but Peter had been in some impossible situations himself, and he'd learned that very little was impossible.

Peter went into the kitchen to fix the food, leaving the two paramedics alone together.

"You sleep okay?" Johnny asked.

"Fine."

"Yeah," said Johnny. He knew his partner too well to believe that, but he didn't push it. "I want to buy something I can use to rub Chet's nose in when we get home," he said. "Why don't you pick up something for the kids?"

"Come on, Johnny, you know we're not going to get home."

Peter could hear the flinch in Gage's voice. "Come on, Roy, why not? We got here, didn't we? If there's a way to get here, there's a way to get home. I know we're going back. They say that Egon guy with the weird haircut is smarter than Einstein. He actually knows some guy who's inventing a time machine. The other three are down there fixing that gizmo right now. We're gonna get home. Just might take a day or so."

"I thought the only reason we came here was because that demon could shift in time. Their gizmo doesn't do that on its own. The demon isn't even in this time. It's in ours."

"Well, who says it has to stay there?" Johnny persisted. "For all we know, it likes this time and came back. Maybe the Ghostbusters will have to go out and bust it, just like we get calls when there's a fire or accident or somebody down. That's what they do. They caught it once, they'll catch it again. If they get a call, I want to ride along on it. They're kind of like firemen, Roy. I mean, they go out on different things than we do, but they live in a firehouse; they even have firepoles. This is the future, Roy. We won't see it again for twelve years. I want to go out and see it. See what the women look like."

"I think you're about to see that." Roy's voice held a note of amusement.

Johnny turned, then his voice brightened with enthusiasm. "Well, hello."

"Hey, guys." It was Janine. Peter left off the eggs long enough to turn around. Yep, Janine had on her usual short skirt and form-fitting top. Johnny evidently found her a delightful sight. "You're the paramedics. Winston said you were here. Time travel? Figures. I can't let these four characters out of my sight before they start importing visitors from the past."

"Hey, Janine," Peter caroled out. "I need to help the guys rebuild the time machine. How'd you like to finish Roy's breakfast? That's Roy DeSoto, and this character with his tongue hanging out at the sight of you is Johnny Gage. No accounting for taste."

"Hah," muttered Janine.

"My tongue's not hanging out," Johnny defended himself.

It might as well have been. Peter recognized in Gage something of a kindred spirit. The guy's interest in the fairer sex was obvious, but Peter had to say that 'well, hello' wasn't exactly the best pick-up line he'd ever heard, even if Janine weren't already in love with Egon.

Janine gave Johnny the kind of smile guaranteed to make him fall instantly in love, then glanced past him at Peter. "Love the apron. You're doing so well with breakfast, Dr. V, that I'll leave you to it. Too many cooks and all that."

"I'm not a cook," Peter objected. "I'm a chef."

"Wearing an apron doesn't make you a chef, not even one that reads 'Cordon Venkman'. I shudder to eat your cooking." She hesitated, glanced sideways at Johnny's hopeful, smitten face, and threw up her hands. "Okay. I don't want to poison people from the past. Go downstairs, Dr. V. Egon and Ray want you to fetch and carry for them."

Belatedly, Peter decided that cooking might have been more fun, but by then, it was too late. "What about my breakfast?" he wheedled plaintively.

"You should have thought of that before. Go on, out of the kitchen."

Peter shrugged out of the apron and tossed it on the counter, a move guaranteed to irk Janine. He grabbed a slice of toast that conveniently popped up and held back long enough to butter it before he departed in haste. Janine waved a spatula at him like a weapon. "Men. You've gotta know how to manage them," she said with satisfaction. Then she turned to Johnny. "Now, what were you saying?"

For the first time since Peter had met the young paramedic, he was speechless.

"We still have a lot of work to do," Egon said shortly before eleven. "We should have it reassembled by tomorrow, and possibly we can do a test of the system in the morning."

"Does that mean we can go home tomorrow?" Johnny asked before Roy could speak the words. It would be easier for him to get a negative than it would be for his partner.

"No," said Egon flatly. "We then have to correlate the data, check the energy levels, and determine if we can recreate what the demon did. That will be the hardest part. Even if we can duplicate the exact energy expended, there is no guarantee that we can reverse the process exactly. It may be that a characteristic inherent in the entity would be necessary for a successful--"

Peter elbowed Egon in the ribcage. "But hey, Egon, you're a brilliant guy. You'll figure a way around that. What about using that destabilizer rectifier thingie? Or calling that Beckett guy." He turned to the paramedics. "Egon's just brainstorming out loud. He does that a lot."

"Oh," said Egon in surprised realization. "Of course I am. We may not be limited to the demon."

"Any sign of it being back?" asked Peter.

"I'll check." Ray went over to the door and opened it, and Johnny exchanged a doubtful glance with Roy. Did he think it would be out there in the garage?

Instead, Ray said, "Hey, Janine, any calls that might be our demon friend?" Johnny remembered Peter instructing Janine earlier to hold all calls unless it was a dire emergency. Janine was a classy lady, but Gage wasn't sure he wanted to take the risk of trying to make time with her. Besides, anybody with eyes could see that she had the hots for Egon. Johnny couldn't imagine that at all. Egon was...weird. He might be the smartest guy Johnny had ever met, from what the other guys said, but he didn't look like he had a clue how to show a lady a good time.

"Nothing," she called back. "I'm keeping track. First sign of it, you hear about it. Her distant voice continued. "Oh, and Ray?"

"Yeah, Janine?"

"You tell Egon I know he can figure it out."

Johnny glanced over at Egon to see how he would react to the note of honey in the secretary's voice. He knew he'd be riding high if any woman talked that way about him. But Egon didn't even appear to notice. He was halfway buried in the innards of his gadget.

"I will." Ray returned, smiling.

"Egon, your fan club is chomping at the bit," Peter said right in Egon's ear.

The physicist jerked, hit his head on the corner of the gizmo, and muttered something under his breath in a language Johnny had never heard before. He pulled out of the equipment, rubbing his head.

"Now, now, Egon, no fair swearing in Sumerian," Peter chided.

Sumerian? Wasn't that an ancient language? Johnny arched an eyebrow at Roy.

Egon ignored Peter. He was good at that. Instead, he circled around to the other side of the device, and raised his eyes. "Peter, fetch me my screwdriver."

Peter eyed the device that lay within easy reach of Egon's last position, then he rolled his eyes, grabbed it up, and muttered, "I ought to hold it hostage." He would have done it, too, if his eyes hadn't fallen on Roy. Visibly holding back the impulse, he walked pointedly around the device and slapped it into Egon's hand the way Dixie McCall might pass Dr. Brackett a scalpel back at Rampart General.

"Dig in, Egon. Your last slave died of overwork, right?"

"That's a death you'll never have to face, Peter."

Ray chuckled and Winston laughed out loud. "You asked for that one, homeboy."

Peter pretended he'd just happened by and didn't know what the joke was all about. "Hey, Egon," he said the very second Egon grew immersed in what he was doing.

The blond head came out from under the gadget. "Yes, Peter?"

"If you're just gonna play for the rest of the day, I think I'll hop into Ecto and show these guys the town. Might be their only chance to explore the future in all its glory. And who better than me to act as tour guide?"

"Assuming they want to visit every sleazy dive south of Delancy Street, I'm sure you're correct."

"Sleazy dives, nothing. I'm gonna show them the Great White Way. Times Square. The best little Greek restaurant I know. Let Johnny get a look at the way the ladies dress in our time. Or we could go out to the beach...." He trailed off as if he'd just remembered it was October and ladies didn't inhabit beaches clad in bikinis in the fall. Johnny heaved a sigh of disappointment. The idea of bikinis getting even smaller appealed to him mightily.

"Take them to the New York Public Library," Egon offered. "Show them the publication dates of lots of books."

"Or show them where we met our first ghost?" Peter asked. "Yeah, you guys ought to see that. Hey, they made a movie about us, about when we got started and our first major bust. Ghostbusters. When it comes out, you go see it. They got Bill Murray to play me."

Roy looked at him in surprise. "Who's Bill Murray?"

Winston decided to accompany the tourist expedition, leaving Ray and Egon to finish their repairs unhindered by Peter. Although Winston could have helped with the repairs, the space was small and three men crowded it. While the rest of them got ready, Zeddemore laid out everything he could as neatly as possible for the two mad scientists, then he corralled Peter, who had sneaked off to grab a catnap, dragged Johnny away from Janine's desk where he'd been boring the secretary with his adventures, and recruited Roy from in front of the television set where he was watching CNN.

Winston took them to a bookstore, where Roy bought a couple of books for his kids. Their publication dates were 1987, which might serve as proof, if they needed it, when they went home. Johnny picked up a Tom Clancy thriller, The Hunt for Red October and a 1988 tour guide of Los Angeles.

The two paramedics gaped at the newer cars, the most obvious proof of changes. Fashions were different, of course, but anything they could see might simply be an East Coast/West Coast distinction.

Winston tried to remember what might be obviously new. Roy had already remarked on the different buildings around the firehouse. It wasn't up to the Ghostbusters to prove the time shift was real. Johnny might be eager to see it all, but, if it turned out that the two men were stuck in a future that had grown away from them, he'd probably turn as morose as Roy.

In the back seat, the younger paramedic and Peter talked baseball scores in defiance of Egon's edict and compared notes on how to score with women. Since Peter's idea of a long-term relationship could usually be measured in weeks, he was a fine one to talk. The more Winston listened, the more he realized Johnny might have an even shorter date span. Peter was a little older and he'd had more time to perfect his line--except that he never quite did. Winston suspected that Johnny and Peter would--over the long term--be very bad for each other.

"It doesn't do any good to encourage them," said Roy in an undertone, as if he'd guessed the tenor of Winston's thoughts. "It never does with Johnny. He falls in love at first sight, sometimes three or four times a week."

"Oh, man, so does Pete," agreed Winston under cover of the raucous conversation from the back seat. "And he thinks he's so suave, and he's not. He does show them a good time, though. He loves to take 'em dining and dancing. But Egon once said that he was favorably impressed with a woman who was a college professor, and Peter told her, 'At least you don't look smart'."

"I meant she didn't look like an egghead," Peter objected. "She knew what I meant. She went out with me afterwards, didn't she?"

"Dragged you to six museums," Winston chortled. "Your ass was grass that time."

"I like smart women," Peter said. "Long as they don't act it."

"Man, it's a good thing Janine isn't here," muttered Winston. "You would be soooo dead."

"Maybe he likes a challenge," put in Johnny, defending his new friend and potential role model.

"Hey!" Peter straightened up, glaring at Winston, who had dared to laugh, and then at Johnny. "Are you implying I'm not smart?"

Gage held up his hands. "I didn't say that. Ray says you've got two doctorates. Two of 'em. You just don't act like it."

"No, then I'd have to talk like Egon, and I'm constitutionally opposed to being served the unabridged dictionary at breakfast. What about you, Johnny? What kind of women do you like?"

"Living ones," muttered Roy, sotto voce.

Johnny reached forward and poked his shoulder. "Come on, that's not fair. You know I like the classy ones."

"Younger than he is, pretty. Brains optional," continued Roy.

"No fair. Am I picking on you? You sound as bad as Chet. He never lets up. What did I do to deserve this, I ask you? Here I am, a good, clean-living boy, any mother's dream son-in-law, and what do I get? Derision. Scorn. And from my best friend, too. Life is cruel, that's what I think. What do you say, Peter? Isn't life cruel?"

"You called that one," Peter grinned. "And you're a fireman, too. Almost as good as being famous." He smirked a bit, no doubt remembering the women who had come up to him and asked him for his autograph in the bookstore.

"Yeah, and I'm not bad looking. What do you think?"

"Have to ask Janine that one," Peter responded. "After all, I don't go around thinking about guys being good looking--unless I want them to play me in our next movie. Hey, Johnny, they're gonna do another movie about us. They've started filming it already. I think I'm gonna have to start a fan club."

"You aren't the one to start it," Winston retorted. "Some fan has to start it."

"Well, I'll have one, anyway."

"Is he always like that?" asked Roy. He was smiling, a lot more relaxed. The kidding had been good for him.

"Every second of every single day," agreed Winston. "Okay, Pete, where's this Greek restaurant of yours? I need to fortify myself before I go any farther."

"Turn right," Peter said at once. "It's only a few blocks from here."

Egon laid aside the screwdriver and replaced the casing. "There. It's ready for testing."

Ray stood up and stretched. "Good."

It was shortly after two a.m. and the rest of the Ghostbusters and the paramedics had turned in. Winston and Peter had kept the two men from the future busy touring New York until early evening. They had hit several of the tourist spots--The Statue of Liberty, the UN, and the Empire State building. After a quick dinner of Chinese takeout, Peter, Roy, and Johnny had settled down to watch videos, while Winston helped Ray and Egon for awhile. Roy hadn't done much 'watching', Winston had reported, he'd just stared at the wall. Johnny had finally convinced him to get some rest.

"Do you have the readings, Ray?"

"Gosh, yeah, Egon. I think we were smart to reinforce all the wiring this time around." He raised a P.K.E. meter. "I just don't see how we can do it without the entity, though. I feel so bad for poor Roy. He sure misses his family."

"Did he ever try to call anyone else? His fire station? His in-laws?" Until now, Egon had been too wrapped up in the repairs to think about such matters, but he felt a deep sympathy for the two men stranded in the wrong time. To be separated from everything that mattered was impossible to contemplate. He knew. When he'd been Tolay's prisoner in the Netherworld, there had seemed no hope of rescue and he had despaired of ever seeing his friends and his home again.

So he owed it to Johnny and Roy to see that they got home. They would not be here at all if it weren't for him. That he had not allowed for a time-shifting demon in his calculations was a grave oversight, and that he'd attempted transfer knowing the beast might possess those abilities was an unconscionable lapse of judgment. They had believed the demon capable of only minute shifts in time, and it had been possible that Ray's theory was incorrect, that it was merely shifting from location to location, but it was still an unwarranted assumption. He had believed that the dimensionometer's energy field would stop such time shifts, just as the ghost trap's containment field had. He'd been incorrect. He was sure only Peter realized the guilt he felt over the whole mishap. But Egon didn't have the luxury of wallowing in such a pointless exercise as culpability. Instead, he had the responsibility to make it right, if possible, and, if impossible, to compensate the two paramedics for their loss.

But it would be better to undo what he had done. If he could gain understanding on the function of time travel, he would share it with his friend Sam Beckett. If what they had here proved to be a combination of unique circumstances that could not be adapted, he would still document it fully.

Ray's answer to his question brought him back. "No, he didn't try to call anybody else. I know Johnny didn't. He said something about not messing with the time line, but I don't think he has many relatives. And I think Roy was halfway afraid to call his wife's parents, in case they said Joanne had married again. I don't think he couldn't have taken that." Ray checked the meter settings. "Just think, if I got stuck in the future, and I found out you guys had another Ghostbuster in here in my place, I'd sure hate that. Imagine being here without the others, working with different people."

Egon stomped down the unpleasant image of himself working here in the future surrounded by strangers. No, that possibility did not bear contemplation. Nothing could be worse.

"We'll try a simple power-up," he said quickly.

The first tests went well. The reinforced wiring added extra support and the transfer field proved the most stable they had yet achieved. Egon dictated the results into his portable tape recorder for Janine to transcribe later.

"I've been considering possibilities," Egon said thoughtfully when he'd finished. "Your molecular phase amplifier also has some transfer capabilities."

"I know. When I had to put everything together so fast, I incorporated some of the concepts of this." He nodded at the powered-down dimensionometer. "But I needed something two-way, something quick. They're similar, but the phase amplifier merely opens up a doorway to the Netherworld, and powerful ghosts can cross back from there. That's why we've never used it to get rid of ghosts."

"What about recreating all the factors of the accident, programming in the exact readings we got at that moment."

"Simulating the demon energy with an amplifier, you mean? Hmm, that could be interesting. I've considered that. I don't believe it would work as well as the last time--unless, of course, the demon was waiting patiently for us in the firehall of 1976 to be retrieved, and there is no reason to speculate on such an unlikely possibility."

"But the demon did phase-shift into the past because Roy and Johnny saw it--after we lost sight of it. But did they see it there, or did they merely see it in the transition? But did it come out of midair and they got sucked into the vacuum it left. Gosh, Egon, even if we had the demon back to use in the process, what's to stop it from sucking a couple of other firemen through when we send Johnny and Roy back?"

Egon frowned. "I've been considering that. The simplest, easiest, and least likely solution is that the pathway between now and 1976 is still open or that its potential to be open still exists, that the device, with a duplication of the energy, will open onto that time, since it was the last destination. I would be astonished if it were that easy; and when we powered up, I got no such indications."

Roy was the first one up the next morning and Johnny found him in the common room at seven. The rest of the Ghostbusters were stirring, even Peter, the avowed morning hater, but for a moment the two men were alone. Johnny sat down by his partner and leaned back on the couch, staring across the room. "Sure is different now...here.... You know what I mean."

"Yeah."

"It's gonna be okay, Roy. I know it."

Gage's voice was so serious that DeSoto let himself smile for a minute. "Sure, John. It'll work out, somehow."

The sound of voices and footsteps heralded the approach of the Ghostbusters. Winston headed for the kitchen, announcing, "Cereal and milk. We have work to do." Everybody moved with him as far as the dining area.

Ray followed him and moments later they appeared with several boxes, a gallon of milk, bowls and spoons, and set them on the dining table. Roy eyed the assortment of cereal with a slight smile. They fit the ghost hunting quartet. Lucky Charms, Count Chocula, BooBerry, Shredded Wheat, and Granola. He reached for the Shredded Wheat. Johnny grabbed the Count Chocula. They took their cereal downstairs with them.

Ray was filling the other two Ghostbusters in on the test they'd performed last night. "We're hoping the channel to the past is still there and ready to be opened. The power level readings didn't quite match what we expected. What we need is another ghost, something to begin the process."

"Send Slimer," offered Peter as they reached the lab. "At least then the little spud would be good for something. I'd be rid of him and he couldn't do any harm to the past."

"Peter!" Shock filled Ray's face. "We couldn't do that. Slimer's our friend."

"I'm serious, Ray." Peter finished his cereal and strolled into the room and surveyed the device, the rest of them behind him. "Not just because I don't want to get slimed any more or wake up with ectoplasm all over my pillow. These guys are paramedics. They save lives. They're good at it. While they're stuck here, they're not saving lives back home."

Ray looked distressed. "But we can't send Slimer away like that. We can use another ghost. We can get one out of the containment unit. I know it's tough to retrieve one, but we can do it."

"Other paramedics are doing our jobs," Roy said quickly, even though he looked like it half killed him to admit it. "Don't use Slimer. Use a ghost who isn't your friend."

"Hey, yeah," said Johnny quickly. "There are lots of them here, you say. Maybe the next one you bust will be able to do this time thing. Maybe lots of ghosts can, did you ever think of that? What's the point of being a ghost, if you don't have ghostly powers?" He wiggled his fingers and made a spooky sound. "Maybe I can even take one home and put it in Chet's bed. Sliming him would be the ultimate prank." His mouth quirked at the idea, but Egon saw sadness in his eyes.

"You can't do that, Junior," Roy chided him. "There's no Ghostbusters in our time to catch it." He advanced on the machine. "Is it finished?"

"Finished and ready." Ray caught his arm and dragged him over. "See? When we power up, the transfer screen materializes here, and then we can send ghosts through." He pointed to a bank of buttons. "This is where we set the location, the destination grid. We'll set it the same way we did before, which was an alternate dimension."

"Hey, Egon?" Peter propped his elbow against Egon's shoulder and leaned. Johnny noticed the position. Maybe he'd try it on his friend Chet when he got home. If he got home.

"Yes, Peter?"

"Both times things went ka-flooey with this gizmo, a demon was responsible--not just an ordinary ghost. Guess that means Slimer can stay." He flicked an apologetic glance in Ray's direction. "Bet that means we need a demon to do it right. Okay, so time before it wasn't the demon so much as it was that reporter guy messing with the controls, but d'you think maybe we just need the energy of a demon to--uh, push your dimension hopper up to the new level?"

Egon slid back from under Peter's weight and frowned. Now, there was an intriguing possibility. Even apart from the demon's temporal abilities, perhaps Class 7 energy combined with the extant field might initiate a difference in the transfer medium. If they could duplicate the energy, feed in all the readings from last time, plug in the directional factor, might the currents and eddies of time provide the rest, in much the same way that the molecular phase amplifier's energy would direct a test transferee to the same general area of the Netherworld that had been last visited? "Peter, as much as it astonishes me to admit it, I think you might have something here."

"What can I say, I'm just a force for good in our time."

"What does all this mean?" Roy asked, his eyes hopeful. "Does this mean we can go home?"

"Sounds like there's a good chance of it, buddy," Winston reassured him.

"Yeah, but there's one thing we have to do first," objected Ray as Egon pried open the cover to the portal's controls and let his mind drift to the setting changes he wanted to make to test his hypothesis.

"What's that?" asked Johnny warily.

"Catch a demon."

"Oh, great," muttered Gage.

"Well," Peter reassured. "At least we think we can use any Class 7 demon instead of just the specific one that can time shift."

"Oh. Of course. And how often do you come across demons?"

"More often than we like," was the ominous, but strangely heartening, answer.

"Did you hear that, Roy?" Johnny babbled as the two of them left Egon to his Rube Goldberg contraption and headed up to the second floor. "Catch a demon. Just like that. That's so weird, you know. Sounds like something Chet might say." Johnny paused long enough on the stairs to flash a hopeful and ingratiating smile at Janine, who'd arrived a few minutes before. She looked back levelly, but there was no trace of encouragement in her expression. Johnny sighed inaudibly.

"Miss him?" Roy teased.

The question completely took Johnny's mind off the gorgeous Miss Melnitz. "Miss him? Miss Chester B? Come on, give me a break, Roy. The best thing about being here is that nobody's pulling pranks on me, rigging my locker with water balloons, putting tabasco sauce in my clam chowder or whipped cream in my boots. Last week, he put peanut butter in the sleeves of my turnout coat. It's almost enough to make me want to stay in the future. I mean, I...." He ran down. Roy was safe. Roy would never give him away. "Okay, yeah, I miss everything back there. Maybe even old Chet. But if you tell him I said so, I'll tell Joanne about the way your eyes nearly fell out when we did that rescue on the girl in that tiny bikini last week."

"I'm married, not dead." Roy's face grew grave. "Johnny, I've just got to get home. I can't do this to Joanne and the kids. Sure, she'd have my insurance, but if I'm just missing back there and not declared dead, she might not even get that. We've got a little in savings, but it's expensive raising kids. I can't just stay here and know that she might be in need, that she might have to sell the house or go on welfare."

Johnny clapped him on the shoulder with a reassurance he didn't entirely feel. "We're gonna get back, buddy. We just have to believe it. It doesn't do us any good to imagine we won't. We need a positive attitude here. We can do it."

Roy shook his head. "I listened to them in there and I didn't get half of it, but it sounds like, like babble to me. Like they were winging it."

"Look, Egon's brilliant. Imagine having him for a buddy. You'd get physics at the breakfast table."

"Instead of you and Chet one-upping each other? I don't think the other Ghostbusters mind. They remind me of our shift at the station, y'know."

Johnny nodded. "Friends--but more. I went out with Nancy Meadows once."

"The shrink?" Roy scowled, trying to follow his partner's jump. "You never said anything about that."

"Well, can you imagine the guys getting on my case if I did? Besides, it didn't work out. She wanted to psychoanalyze me, right over dinner. Can you believe it? Started telling me about all my, uh, personality quirks. No guy likes that. It's as bad as that stewardess I went out with who told me all my faults. Peter doesn't psychoanalyze me all the time. Why do women think they have the right to tell a man what they think is wrong with him?"

"So what did Nancy say?" Roy headed off the diatribe easily.

"She talked about something she called 'crisis bonding'. She said it's because when it comes down to life and death, you get to the essentials fast. There's nobody you can trust more but the buddy who faces death at your side, the guy who might save your life. It's something ordinary civilians don't understand and it creates this bond thing. And you know what, Roy? She's right. Because there is a bond. Firemen have it. I mean I'd trust you with my life. And any of the guys at the station. Just like these guys are with each other. I like them, even Egon. And for a shrink, Peter's a great guy."

Ray's eyes twinkled with amusement. "Oh yeah, Peter's a lot like you."

"Like me? He's not like me. Well, maybe he is kind of a ladies' man."

Johnny made a face at him. "Anyway, we'll be out of here soon. If we're lucky, we won't even have to see Slimer again. That's one thing about the future I won't miss."

"No, but you'll have to see a demon."

"Oh, thanks for reminding me. Now I've got that to look forward to. You know what, Roy, I--"

Before he could finish, a deafening alarm bell sounded through the firehouse. The two firemen jumped, then gazed at each other in alarm. It was a lot more attention-getting than the tones that summoned them on a call back at Station 51. Reflexes took over and Johnny dashed for the nearest firepole, with Roy right behind him.

Janine met them when they came down and she shoved a proton pack at each of them. Peter and Winston had showed them the Ghostbusters' weapons the evening before, including the proton pack that Winston had explained was a portable nuclear accelerator. The Ghostbusters walked around with the start of World War III on their backs every day. "Put these on and hurry," she said. "We've got major trouble."

Johnny slid his arms through the straps of the unfamiliar weapon pack. Maybe it wouldn't be any worse than using an inch and a half line on a fire. The only problem was, a fire wasn't deliberately fighting back.

Peter ran out of the back room, yelling, "Janine! Janine, where's the packs?"

"Right here." She passed him another one. He slid into it in a second, grabbing for the next one. "Quick. Ray and Winston are powered up, but Egon needs one."

"I can fight, too," the secretary reminded him as Johnny examined the controls on the handle of the thrower to see what he should do next.

"Take the spare pack over by the lockers," Peter told her. "It's only got half a charge, but it's better than nothing. Come on." He waved a hand at Johnny and Roy. "Your prayers are answered. It's back."

The two paramedics exchanged one doubtful, worried, relieved look and raced after Peter toward the back lab.

"This is incredible, Raymond," Egon exclaimed as Peter led his two new recruits into the lab. "Whatever you do, don't hit the device."

"Oh, great, Egon," Ray complained. "Now it'll know where to hide."

"If it speaks English." Winston sent off a blast of particle energy toward the hulking beast that loomed in the corner. The minute he fired, the entity popped out and reappeared a second later on the other side of the room, right next to John Gage, who had just managed to power up his thrower.

At the sight of the hulking demon beside him, the fireman let out a stunned yelp and jumped sideways in a leap that Nijinski would have envied. "Look at that! Roy, look at that! Look at those teeth!"

"Don't look at it. Shoot it! See? Trigger." Peter jammed his thumb against the button of his own thrower handle and fired a hasty burst at the monster, angling his shot so that the blast passed over Roy's head. DeSoto ducked involuntarily.

Ray jumped over next to the dimensionometer to protect it. Maybe he could keep the demon away from it. He had to give Egon cover until Peter could get him his proton pack. Winston circled around and took up a protective stance on the other side as Peter, still firing, raced across the lab and thrust the pack that had been hanging on his arm at Egon.

Roy DeSoto, mouth tight with concentration, jammed his thumb down on the trigger of his thrower and shot the entity neatly right in the chest in a near-perfect blast. No hesitation, no backlash, just like that. Ray gaped at him in astonishment. Usually, when untrained people tried to fire a thrower, the pull of the streams knocked their aim off widely. They usually shot out holes in walls and knocked down light fixtures. Ray himself had bagged a maid's cart and a chandelier on the team's first bust. But there was Roy DeSoto, calmly firing as if he did it every day.

Johnny copied his partner's action, and he was right on the money, too. His knuckles were a little too white on the thrower handle, and he wasn't as rock-steady as the Ghostbusters were, but he hit the target first time out, too. Spotting it, Peter let out a, "Yahoo! Deadeye Desoto and Hot Shot Gage, right on the money!"

The demon phased out again and the two firemen pulled their shots.

"It's the fire hoses!" Ray cried. "That's why they're so good at it."

Johnny's face lit up in a delighted smile. "Did you see that, Roy? Wasn't that the greatest thing you ever saw? Not that I like the monster, but firing these things is a real blast."

The demon materialized at Winston's side with an inarticulate roar and swatted the black Ghostbuster across the chest with its taloned hand before anyone had time to react. Winston's breath went out in a painful whoosh and blood traced a line across his shirt front as he fell. Paramedic training kicking in, Johnny and Roy started to go to him.

"No, get the demon," Winston wheezed. "I can wait. Go, guys."

Fighting his instincts, Johnny, who had the clearest shot, fired again and caught the beast in his stream.

"You got him, you got him." Peter pelted across the room to get in the clear and his shot caught the scaled beast from the other direction.

Janine, now armed, raced in and skidded to a stop. Her headlong run brought her up between Johnny and Peter, and she added her fire to theirs.

The demon tossed his head back and emitted a chilling laugh. It didn't speak to them. Maybe it really couldn't speak English. Instead, it phased neatly out of the streams and vanished.

The seconds ticked away and it didn't come back.

"Be careful." Peter edged in Winston's direction. "Watch for it. It's coming. I know it is." He dropped a hand on Zeddemore's shoulder. "You okay, big fella? Can you catch your breath?"

Winston wheezed a half-hearted affirmative at him and concentrated on breathing.

"I never saw anything like that before." John Gage's eyes were huge, his fingers curled tightly around the thrower. "Did you, Roy? I didn't think there could be things like that. Maybe the future's not very safe. I bet people buy demon insurance."

Roy shifted uneasily, but when he opened his mouth to speak, no words emerged. Instead, he focused on something that was more natural to him; he went to Winston and knelt at his side, his entire concentration on the injured man. The paramedic was having trouble reconciling what had just happened with reality. With a hasty examination of the injured man, DeSoto said quickly, "This isn't bad, everybody. Just some shallow cuts and only one of them's really bleeding. I don't think it will even need stitches. Winston, lean forward a little. Take a slow breath. Easy, easy."

Ray craned his neck to see. A row of three parallel scratches ran across Winston's chest. One of them was little more than a welt, another had spotty blobs of blood strung out in a line, and the third, and deepest had bled more freely, but it didn't look that bad. Johnny looked around for a first aid kit.

Tension ran out of the Ghostbusters in a rush as they realized their buddy wasn't badly hurt.

"They do sell ghost insurance," Peter filled in the silence with a quick grin. He shifted cautiously on his toes, glancing over his shoulder repeatedly. Beside him, Ray scowled. Peter had a sixth sense where ghosts were concerned. Peter gave a sudden grin. "Maybe we should buy some. Our medical carrier is gonna catch on one day and raise our rates so much...."

"It isn't far away," warned Egon, P.K.E. meter in hand. "I can detect its presence well within meter range." Long fingers made minute adjustments to the dials. He'd give them all the warning he possibly could. "Are you all right, Winston?"

"Oh, yeah, just great. I love it when demons use me as a ping pong ball."

"So you mean he didn't just pop into the future?" Ray went over to the window and peered out. "Not out here."

"I think it did time shift, but only momentarily, to take it out of the streams," Egon decided. "Once away from us, it would be free to circle around and come back at us from another angle."

At the calm tones, Roy cast an incredulous glare at him, although his hands didn't stop their work on Winston's chest.

Johnny who had retrieved the first aid kit handed it to Roy.

The demon materialized right beside the pool table that had been shoved into the corner to make room for the experiment, and flung the table at Peter, Johnny, and Janine.

"Look out, Janine!" Egon cried and took two quick steps in her direction, although he couldn't possibly reach her in time.

Trained to respond automatically in a crisis, Johnny grabbed her and flung her to safety while Peter dodged wildly in the other direction. In spite of his frantic scramble sideways, the table clipped him hard across the shoulder, and he let out a choked-off cry, dropped his thrower, and fell, half-buried under the ruined table. Johnny and Janine landed in a heap just clear of it on the other side.

"Peter!" yelled Ray, conscious of Egon yelling right along with him. Immobile in the wreckage, Peter didn't answer. Ray took an involuntary step toward him that was brought up short when the demon threw back its head and produced a triumphant howl so eerie that even Ray felt his blood run cold.

Ignoring the streaks of blood that stained his chest, Winston jumped up before Roy could tape a dressing into place. He yanked the trap from his pack and flung it beneath the gloating demon before it could dive at Peter. "Egon! Ray!" He hollered. "Now!"

The two Ghostbusters fired as one, and Roy bounced up after Winston and joined in with as neat a shot as a pro. The four streams pinned the demon so firmly that, in spite of all its struggles, it couldn't phase out.

"We got it, we got it!" hollered Ray. "Don't let it get to Pete."

From their tangle on the floor, Janine said sarcastically, "Watch your hands, Gage," which made Egon risk one quick, alarmed glance in that direction before he turned his attention back to keeping the demon away from Peter. Johnny scrambled to his feet beside her, a comical expression of complete innocence on his face, and fumbled with the cord for his thrower. The two of them joined their fire to that of the others. The demon thrashed savagely in its struggle to break free, half-yanking Janine off her feet before she planted them squarely and braced herself against the pull. One clawed hand took out the glass in the nearest window, another hit the dangling light overhead and sent it swinging wildly. Shadows darted back and forth across the room.

"Take that," Ray yelled fiercely as he poured on the protonic energy. He wanted the demon to go down in the worst way. If only Peter would say something.... If only they could spare the paramedics to check him out.

Winston stomped down hard on the trigger and the trap opened. The brilliant white light made both firemen cry out in astonishment and squeeze their eyes shut, but neither one of them altered his fire by so much as an inch.

Conscious of Peter, unmoving and partly buried, Ray squashed down the knot in the pit of his stomach and started to work the demon down into the trap. "Force him right in there. Work him down. Johnny, Roy, direct him toward the trap." He made a couple of exaggerated motions with his thrower to display what he meant. The two firemen obeyed, a little less expertly than the Ghostbusters but well enough that it added to the overall effect.

The demon didn't want to go. If there had been even one less particle stream on it, the entity might have found the strength to time-shift, but no one let up. "We're doing it," cried Ray. "We're doing it."

"Now!" ordered Egon as the demon hovered at the mouth of the trap." Six streams powered down and the twin doors of the trap slammed shut even as the demon tried to swim back out to freedom. The light died and, even though it was morning with sunlight streaming through the shattered window, the room seemed momentarily dim. The trap bounced once, then it was still.

"Is that it?" Johnny blurted in astonishment. "Did we do it?"

"You bet we did, buster," Janine reassured him. "See that light on the trap? It means he's in there."

Gage's shoulders sagged in relief and he whirled automatically even as his partner moved with equal purpose.

Egon slammed his thrower into his holster, scooped up the trap to deposit it on the table, and lunged across the room to Peter, with Ray and Winston behind him.

Gage and DeSoto beat them there. It was what they were trained for. Johnny curled his fingers around Peter's wrist to take his pulse and, when Egon opened his mouth to fling a stream of urgent questions at him, the young paramedic held up his other hand for silence. He was counting respiration, Ray realized. While he did that, Roy worked efficiently and purposefully at freeing Peter from the rubble that had once been a pool table.

As the Ghostbusters converged on their downed friend, Roy spared them one quick glance. "Winston, take off your pack and sit down. I'll put a dressing on that cut as soon as we get Peter stabilized."

"This? A long scratch, that's all. He just grazed me. Take care of Pete first. I can bandage myself." Winston wiggled out of his pack and set it aside only because there wasn't room to join in the freeing of Peter. He contented himself with setting up a relay to take the pieces from Ray or Egon and toss them out of the way, ignoring the fresh beads of blood that sprang up on his chest as he moved.

With all of them working on it, Peter was freed in minutes. He lay unmoving, his face pale. As Ray edged uneasily closer, he realized he could hear Peter's breathing and could even see his chest rising and falling. Peter had landed on his side, half against his proton pack, his right arm outflung. It didn't seem to